


Grimm Sisters

by Apathetic_Abstract_Apotheosis



Category: RWBY
Genre: Alternate Universe - Rock Band, Angst and Porn, Autism Spectrum, BDSM, F/F, Fluff and Smut, Lesbian Character, Trans Female Character
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2021-02-25
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:20:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 39,897
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26300308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Apathetic_Abstract_Apotheosis/pseuds/Apathetic_Abstract_Apotheosis
Summary: Weiss leaves her cushy job as a classical musician and falls in with Grimm Sisters, a small-time punk band. Together they must navigate the ruthless world of the music industry, trying to make it big without falling apart. (No enabler)
Relationships: Blake Belladonna/Ruby Rose, Blake Belladonna/Ruby Rose/Weiss Schnee/Yang Xiao Long, Blake Belladonna/Weiss Schnee, Blake Belladonna/Yang Xiao Long, Raven Branwen/Summer Rose, Ruby Rose/Weiss Schnee, Weiss Schnee/Yang Xiao Long
Comments: 165
Kudos: 296





	1. Chapter 1

Weiss had been staring at the advert pinned to the shop’s notice board for about five minutes now. Like most of the other pieces of paper pinned to the board advertising various second hand instruments or looking for band members, it was printed on cheap A4 paper. What set it apart from the others, however, was that it had cutesy drawings of instruments all over it that had clearly been done by hand and by someone whose enthusiasm outpaced their artistic talents.

* * *

_ WANTED _

_ Audio Engineer _

Qualifications not required, just a portfolio of stuff you’ve mixed

$150 to mix an EP

For details, talk to Raven at the front counter

* * *

Weiss had only gone into the music store to get some rosin after she’d foolishly left hers behind while fleeing the mansion with as many of her instruments as she could carry. At the time, she’d justified it as them being worth the most money, reasoning that she could sell them in case her scant funds ran out. Deep down though, she knew she could never bear to part with them, she was far too attached to her instruments.

Of course, now that her aforementioned funds were running low and the payment on the cheap motel she was staying at was due, she might have to do the unthinkable and part with one of her beloved instruments.

One might say that if money was so important then buying rosin was a pointless expense, but Weiss needed it for her last ditch attempt at raising funds, namely busking on whatever street corner she could find.

How far she had fallen, from being one of the biggest up-and-coming classical musicians in the country to scrimping and saving and planning to spend her time playing her heart out on the street for a few bucks. It almost made her wonder if her freedom was worth it.

But here, perhaps, was her salvation, at least for the next couple of days. It wasn’t much money and the ad looked painfully amateurish, but beggars can’t be choosers. Finally tearing her gaze away from the advert and its oddly charming drawings, Weiss looked over at the counter by the front door. Sitting behind it was a woman in her mid-forties with a long unkempt mane of black hair tied back with a bandana, her angry red eyes focused on a magazine.

Warily, Weiss approached the counter and coughed quietly to get the attention of the woman. “Um, excuse me. Are you Raven?”

“Yeah, you looking for anything in particular?” Raven looked up from her magazine, her gaze raking over Weiss and her dishevelled yet obviously expensive clothes.

“No, there was an ad over there.” Weiss waved in the general direction of the notice board. “For the audio engineer gig. It said to ask you for more details.”

Raven cocked an eyebrow and set the magazine aside, her attention now fully on Weiss. “I see… Do you have a portfolio on you all the time or something?”

“I’m sorry?”

“I’ve never seen you in here before and I know for a fact that’s the only place that job’s been advertised.” The woman’s mouth curled up into a smirk and Weiss shuffled awkwardly under her intense gaze. “So you’ve either got the portfolio they asked for on you or you’re  _ very  _ confident in your abilities.”

“I… uhhhhh…” Weiss admittedly was confident in her skills, but the sheer presence of the woman behind the counter made her seriously reconsider, as well as robbing her of her ability to speak coherently.

“Rae-Rae, are you tormenting  _ another _ customer?” A voice called out from behind Weiss and she turned to see another woman emerging from a room down a back corridor of the store. She looked to be about the same age as Raven, though her hair was a lot neater, cut to shoulder length and had a red ombré, and her gaze was fixed firmly on Raven, who shuffled awkwardly in her seat.

“She’s not a customer, she was asking about that audio job Ruby and Yang put up.” The other woman frowned at Raven, marching around the counter and flicking her on the ear.

“That still doesn’t mean you can be mean. Do you need a refresher on customer service?”

“No…” Raven grumbled, pouting up at the other woman. “Can’t you let me have this though, Summer? The girls have been so insistent on not letting us help, can’t I at least vet the person who’s going to mix their first EP?”

“It’s precisely because they don’t want us interfering in their band that you shouldn’t.” Summer told Raven sternly, flicking her on the ear again. “They’re not little girls anymore and we have to trust them to make their own decisions.”

“$150 is a lot of money for them, I just want to make sure they’re getting their money’s worth.” Raven argued petulantly, her arms folded defiantly. “This girl only just showed up and saw the notice. How do we know if she’s any good?”

“Again, it’s their decision, it’s their money and we should trust their judgement.” Summer set down firmly. “And I’m sure this young lady wouldn’t ask unless she thought she was up to the job…” For the first time, Summer looked properly at Weiss and her eyes widened before she broke into a small smile.

“You know... I think she’s actually more than qualified for the job.” Raven looked between Weiss and Summer in confusion, opening her mouth to question the latter only for her to be cut off by Summer. “And she’s in luck, they’re practising in the back right now. We can see what they have to say.” Stepping out from behind the counter, Summer gestured for Weiss to follow her back down the corridor she’d come from earlier.

After hesitating for a moment, Weiss followed the woman, if anything just to escape the scrutiny of Raven, whose gaze she could still feel on her back. “You’ll have to forgive my wife. She likes to act tough, but she’s a softie really.”

“I see…” Weiss continued to follow Summer down the corridor at the back of the store and as they went, they passed a few doors, the faint strains of music coming from some of them.

“We rent out the rooms to independent music teachers and local bands.” Summer explained as Weiss paused outside one room in horror as painful screeching sounds of a violin drifted out. “Helps us keep a fairly steady stream of customers as well.”

They turned a corner which revealed the end of the corridor. A door with the sign, ‘Employees only’ attached was at the far end, but Summer led Weiss over to one just to its right. On it was a small sign holder which Weiss supposed was to indicate room occupancy and reservations.

Attached to the door was a sign that read ‘Grimm Sisters!!’ in an untidy scrawl, complete with the same crude drawings as the ad. Weiss could also hear faint strains of guitar music from behind the door as Summer laid a hand on the handle before pausing for a moment.

“If there’s something going on with you and your father, I won’t pry. But if you need money, we’ve been looking for an assistant for the store.” Weiss blinked in surprise. She supposed she shouldn’t be all that surprised that someone would eventually recognise her and it made sense that it would be the woman who worked at a music store.

“Thank you…” She wasn’t sure what else to say to the kind offer.

“Oh, and don’t mind Yang too much, she takes after Raven.” With this warning, Summer knocked on the door and pushed it open. “Girls?”

“Is our time up already? I thought we had the room until 4?” A high piping voice asked as Summer entered the room, Weiss hovering in the doorway behind her.

“No, you’ve still got some time left, kiddo. I got someone who wants to meet you, she’s interested in the sound engineer gig.” Summer stepped aside and gestured for Weiss to enter the room, which she did a little hesitantly.

There were three other women sitting around the room, all about Weiss’ age, one with dark hair, one who looked like a younger and blonder Raven, and a third with a similar ombré to Summer. This last one hopped to her feet, grinning widely as she set aside a beat-up electric guitar.

“Oh yay! Hihihi!” She squealed, bouncing excitedly on the spot. “I’m Ruby! You can mix our EP?”

“I’ll leave you four to it.” Summer told the group, walking around Weiss and exiting the practice room, closing the door behind her, leaving Weiss with the three strangers.

“Hey, I’m Blake.” The dark-haired woman spoke up, breaking the slightly awkward silence in the wake of Summer’s departure. “I’m guessing you saw our ad.”

“Yeah, I did.” Weiss shifted uncomfortably under their collective gaze, particularly that of the blonde sat behind the drums, who glared at her as she twirled a stick threateningly. “I don’t exactly have a portfolio though.”

“Then why are you here?” The blonde asked, her expression twisting into a disapproving frown. “We specifically put on there that we wanted people with stuff so we could listen to it and see if you’re what we’re looking for.”

“And I already told you, Yang, that’s not the sort of thing people who are gonna take a job like ours will have.” Blake chided, not really paying attention to her friend, preferring instead to fiddle with the tuning pegs of the bass she had in her lap.

“I already said I don’t like the idea of getting someone to mix our tracks, we can do it ourselves.” Yang insisted petulantly, ceasing her stick-twirling and crossing her arms, her heavily muscled biceps flexing intimidatingly and almost certainly on purpose.

“Then it won’t sound nearly as good!” Ruby frowned, having stopped her bouncing and returned to her chair and curled up on it, pulling her hood up to hide her face. “And none of us really know how anyway.”

“That’ll make it sound more authentic!” Weiss was beginning to feel increasingly awkward as it became increasingly apparent she’d somehow ended up in the middle of an ongoing intra-band dispute.

“Maybe I should just go…” She suggested, already moving to the door, but was halted by Blake calling her back.

“Don’t you need the money? I imagine that’s why you’re here, since you’ve cut ties with your father.” Weiss spun around to glare at Blake, who was still nonchalantly playing with her battered bass. Ruby and Yang were also staring at her, but more out of curiosity than irritation.

“How do you know that?” Ruby asked, cocking her head like a curious puppy.

“Neither of you recognise one of classical music’s rising stars?” Blake finally looked up at the others, a wry smirk on her face. “Weiss Schnee? The store literally sells some of her recordings.”

“Schnee sounds familiar…” Ruby mumbled looking back at Weiss, head still tilted.

“They’re one of the largest media conglomerates out there.” Glaring at Weiss once again, Yang narrowed her eyes at the nervous young woman. “They’ve got fingers in pretty much every pie. Film, TV, you name it, they’ve probably got a hand in it.”

“Including a record label, which currently produces only one artist.” Blake turned her smirk on Weiss who merely scowled back.

“A now defunct record label, since their sole talent tore up her contract a couple of weeks ago and it was only created as a vanity project to produce said talent.” She replied rather snippily, her arms folding defensively.

“Fancied a trip out of your ivory tower, eh? See what it’s like to slum it with the real musicians?” Yang mocked, still looking decidedly unimpressed with Weiss.

“Why I cut ties with Schnee Records is none of your business, but your knowledgeable friend is right that I do need the money.”

“ I still don’t like this, we should just do it ourselves.” Yang insisted again, this time earning a withering look from Blake.

“She just said she needs the cash, Yang. You really wanna do that to her? Also, it’s mostly my money, so I get more say.”

“Ruby and I chipped in as much as we could.” Yang pointed out, and Weiss was again struck by the need to leave the room and escape the argument, a sentiment that Ruby seemed to share as she curled up even more in her chair and all but disappeared into her hoodie. “Not all of us make the same money you do, Blake.”

“I know…”

“And we’re supposed to be in this together, so we all should get a say in this kind of thing. We don’t even know if this girl’s gonna do a good job or not.” Yang gestured at Weiss with one of her sticks so vigorously, she was half-afraid Yang might lose her grip and take out one of Weiss’ eyes with the unintentional missile.

“Well, I suppose that degree in music production my father insisted I take so he could shove more work onto me on top of the performance work  _ could  _ be of use.” Weiss snarked, finally growing weary of the argument she’d unintentionally become embroiled in. If she didn’t need the money so much, she’d have left ages ago. “But since you don’t seem to care about qualifications, I guess it’s just a worthless bit of paper.”

There was a small snort of laughter from within the hoodie and Ruby emerged slowly, though she still looked a little on edge. “I like her, I think she’ll make our stuff sound even more awesome than it already does.”

“Me too, and we’ll be helping out someone who’s in need. You can’t say that not punk.” Yang groaned loudly at Blake’s last argument and the dark-haired woman slouched back in victory as the blonde got to her feet.

“Fine, you two win. I’ll go talk to Mom about booking the big room for recording in.” Still grumbling under her breath, Yang brushed past Weiss and out of the room, shutting the door with a little more force than strictly necessary.

“I’m sorry about her.” Blake spoke up after a moment of silence. “The band means a lot to Yang and she can get kinda… controlling about its direction.”

“I see…” Weiss raised an eyebrow but said nothing else. Yang’s behaviour seemed to extend a little bit beyond ‘kinda controlling’, but then again, she’d had to work with other people who could be just as obsessive about things going perfectly. There was no way she’d be able to forget that one conductor during her brief stint as first violin at the college orchestra, God, he’d been such a control freak.

“Yeah, Yang’s great when you get to really know her.” Ruby chipped in, pulling down her hood and starting to bounce excitedly in her seat now that the conflict was over. “Blaaaake! It’s really happening!” Without warning, Ruby threw herself across the practice space to wrap Blake in a hug, the dark-haired girl only just able to set her bass aside before the impact. Heat filled Weiss’ cheeks as Ruby’s face ended up buried in Blake’s very… generous cleavage and she looked away, hoping that the band’s name wasn’t indicative of their actual relationships.

“Ack! Yes, it really is.” She choked out as Ruby’s grip constricted her lungs. “Ruby, please.” Ruby released Blake but continued her gleeful bouncing, her hands flapping as she did.

“It’s gonna be great! We’re gonna be a proper band! Look out, world! The Grimm Sisters are going to take you by storm!”

“I hate to put a damper on things, Ruby, but it’s just an EP we’re releasing online, not a world tour.” Blake pointed out in between gasps for air.

“I know, I know. But it’s still something!”

“I suppose you’re right.” Blake smiled indulgently at the eager girl as she continued her happy bouncing.

“Are you all sisters?” Weiss asked, already looking between the two remaining women for similarities. “I mean, given the band’s name…” Blake and Ruby exchanged glances, then burst out into uproarious laughter.

“No, we’re not sisters, thank the goddess, that would make things  _ so  _ weird.” Blake choked out in between peals of laughter.

“Yang and I are sisters and we started the band together. Blake joined later, but we decided to stick with the name.”

“It is a good name though.”

“Eh, I still think Satanic Bunting was better.” Ruby pouted after she finished laughing.

“And that gives an entirely different impression of the kind of music we play. It makes it sound like we’re a fusion of death metal and English folk music or something.”

“I still think it’s a cool band name…” Ruby’s continued pout was interrupted by the door swinging open and Yang stalking back in.

“Right, I’ve sorted it out with Mom and Mama, we’ve got the room tomorrow from 2 and they’ve decided not to kick us out after closing.” Yang sounded oddly displeased with this, but Weiss simply chalked it up to Yang’s reticence to have her work on the EP. “You’re all free then, right?” She addressed Weiss in particular with this question. The joke was on her though, all of Weiss’ time was free nowadays.

“I’m free to do this, literally whenever.” she smiled innocently at Yang, taking some small pleasure in the other woman’s irritation. Weiss didn’t know what was up with her, but hopefully she’d change her tune soon.

“I’ve got no shifts tomorrow, so I’m good.” Ruby chirped, her smile back in place and her hands flapping happily.

“I was thinking of doing a show tomorrow afternoon, but I can push it back.” Blake added, checking her phone.

“Alright, then, I should probably leave the three of you to your practice.” Weiss said, moving towards the door.

“Hey, Weiss. Why don’t you wanna stick around for a bit? Find out what it is you’re working with.” Blake suggested, the suggestion accompanied by a soft growl from Yang. Weiss considered for a moment, her hand resting on the door handle. Then with a small shrug, she turned back to face the band.

“Sure, why not?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And now I shall dip my toes into the pollination pool. Do I know much about indie music or music production or live performance? Nope! Am I gonna let that stop me from writing about horny lesbians angsting and being gay? Also Nope! Hopefully, this will end up going reasonably long, I have plot planned as always so that'll be fun. 
> 
> I've set up a [discord](https://discord.gg/4t3y25e) so feel free to join and stuff, I'm pretty active there these days.
> 
> Big thanks to [machiavellianFictionist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/machiavellianFictionist) for proofreading and being my primary source of knowledge for this. Lots of thanks too to my lovely girlfriend [Ruby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RubyAndNanaAO3) for beta reading and being hella gay and adorable.
> 
> Thank you too to my official supporters, send a PM or hop on the discord server for details.


	2. Chapter 2

“Well… What did you… think?” Ruby panted, trying to catch her breath after the long sustained scream she’d held for long after the last guitar note had faded away. Blinking a few times, Weiss tried to get her thoughts arranged after the onslaught of noise she’d just been subjected to.

“It… certainly was a thing.” She started, shaking her head in an effort to clear it.

“That’s it? A thing?” Yang snorted irritably, leaning over her drum kit and glaring at Weiss.

“It’s not exactly the sort of music I normally listen to, or listen to at all, for that matter.” Weiss shrugged, looking over at Blake and Ruby for their reaction. Ruby was busy trying to take her hoodie off and wasn’t paying much attention, whilst the bassist remained impassive and Yang groaned loudly.

“Oh, even better. She doesn’t even listen to our style of music.” She threw her hands up on the air in exasperation. “Lemme guess, you only listen to classical music?”

“Actually, I’m more of a fan of synthpop.” Weiss smirked as Yang’s scowl deepened. “But I did have to listen to a lot of classical music in my previous line of work.” There was a stifled snort of amusement from Ruby as she continued to struggle with her hoodie.

“You want a hand there, Cookie?” Blake snickered as Ruby flailed helplessly.

“...Yes please.” Came the slightly sheepish reply, and Blake rolled her eyes fondly as she got up to help Ruby disentangle herself. As the other two were occupied, Yang continued her interrogation.

“So you listen to stuff that’s a little more recent than fuckin’ Beethoven. You still don’t know our style well enough to mix it properly.” She insisted as Ruby was finally freed from her hoodie, revealing a sinfully tight tank top that had ridden up during the struggle and revealed the beginnings of some abs.

Reflexively, Weiss’ tongue slipped out to wet her lips. Dear God, she was gay. Weiss was unable to tear her eyes away from the sight until Blake coughed loudly. That brought Weiss back to the room with a jolt and she looked up guiltily to see a faintly amused smirk playing across Blake’s face whilst Yang somehow looked even more thunderous.

Ruby didn’t seem to have noticed, however, as she flashed Weiss an innocent smile, completely unaware of how her tanktop was now sticking to her skin. “You did like it though, right? Even if it’s not what you normally listen to.”

“Yes, I did. You’re all rather good, though Yang did keep changing her tempo just a little.”

“I did not!” Yang protested hotly, but was drowned out by a loud yelp of triumph from Ruby.

“I’ve been telling her that for years now and she wouldn’t believe me!” Ruby started performing a victory dance as she continued to gloat. “Vindication! I am vindicated!” Weiss was starting to think she shouldn’t have said anything as Yang glowered at her sister.

“Not all of us can be musical prodigies, Ruby, some of us have to work to be good.” Yang grumbled, twirling her drumstick whilst she continued to glare at her sister.

“Well, if you wanna have all my other sensory issues as well as the musical talent, you’re more than welcome to it.” Ruby grinned smugly and let out another whoop when Yang sighed and shook her head.

“Also, Ruby, you were a little flat on some of the higher notes.” Weiss added, hoping that the criticism of Ruby might alleviate some of the tension between the sisters.

“Yeah… I’m not great of a singer.” Ruby sighed, her glee at being right about something fading quickly. “But I can’t change anything about the music though, it won’t be perfect otherwise, and it has to be.” Weiss blinked in confusion at this sudden change in Ruby’s demeanour.

“Ruby can get rather… particular about her music.” Blake whispered in Weiss’ ear, making her jump.

“Ruby, your singing is fine.” Yang sighed patiently, drumstick still spinning. “So what if it’s a little bit flat?”

“It needs to form a perfect harmony, Yang, if someone who’s never heard the song before knows it’s flat, then it’s flat!” Distress was starting to creep into Ruby’s voice and she’d started fiddling with the hem of her tank top.

“I am, or rather was, a professional musician. If anyone was going to notice it was flat, it would be someone like me. I doubt the casual listener will.” Weiss pointed out, trying to reassure Ruby, but the younger girl was not so easily swayed.

“But what about the critics? It’s their job to know how music should sound. They’ll notice and they’ll know that I’m an awful singer who can’t execute her vision!” Ruby wailed and Weiss was rather glad they were in a soundproof room. Weiss wasn’t sure what she should do. This wasn’t what she’d intended with her criticisms.

She was saved from having to do anything, however, by the clatter of drumsticks as Yang practically leaped out from behind her drum kit to pull Ruby into an incredibly tight hug. “It’s okay, Rubes, it’s okay.”

The blonde continued to hug and comfort her sister, now humming something to Ruby whilst Weiss looked on in mild confusion. Looking to Blake for an answer, the bassist just shrugged unhelpfully.

“Not for me to say.” She answered simply, meandered over to her equipment and started to pack it up. Weiss hovered awkwardly by the door, unsure of what to do as the sisters kept up their embrace for what felt like several minutes by now.

“They’ll be at it for a while. You wanna walk out with me?” Blake asked as she hefted her instrument case onto her back and grabbed a messenger bag covered in cat pins.

“Uh, yeah, sure.” Weiss opened the door hastily and slipped out whilst Blake stayed back for a moment to say goodbye to her bandmates.

“See you girls tomorrow, then.” Weiss heard a faint noise in the affirmative from Yang before Blake closed the door and led the way back down the hallway. As they emerged back into the main store, they were immediately accosted by Raven, who towered over the two girls with a dark look on her face.

“Why could I hear Ruby wailing back there?” She asked, looking between Blake and Weiss suspiciously, but mostly focusing on the latter.

“Ruby just had a little meltdown, Yang’s with her.” Blake explained before Weiss could start speaking. “It was nobody’s fault.” Raven seemed to take that as a defence of Weiss and narrowed her eyes at the girl.

“What did you say to my little girl?” Weiss tried her best not to cower beneath Raven’s accusatory gaze, but was saved from answering by an angel in white, who grabbed Raven by the ear and pulled her back.

“Rae-Rae, what did I say about menacing the customers?”

“But she upset Ruby!” Raven protested, contorting her body to follow her ear as Summer dragged her back to the front counter.

“Ruby’s a big girl now, and she’s got Yang to look after her.” Summer reminded her wife sternly, guiding Raven to sit back down behind the counter. “If she wants us to help her calm down, she’ll ask us. But we can’t mother her forever.”

“Whatever…” Raven grumbled, folding her arms as Summer turned a bright smile very similar to Ruby’s on Weiss and Blake.

“So, you’re going to be doing some recording tomorrow, then?” She asked, tilting her head inquisitively as Blake nodded.

“Well, you should know, since we’re using one of your rooms.” A small smile quirked at the corner of her mouth. “Let me guess, you insisted that we didn’t have to pay you for the use of your room?”

“We’re supporting local artists, it has nothing to do with the fact that two of the band’s members are our daughters.” Summer said innocently but with a very guilty grin.

“I’m sure it doesn’t. We’ll see you tomorrow.” Blake smirked at Summer and waved goodbye to them. Weiss was about to follow, when she remembered what she’d come into the store in the first place for.

“Shit, one second, Blake. I need to grab some rosin.” Rolling her eyes and sighing good-naturedly, Blake waited by the door as Weiss ran off to grab a block of rosin and come back to the counter. Raven checked her out moodily, flashing Weiss looks of disdain despite being under Summer’s watchful eye.

Rosin paid for and bagged, Weiss joined Blake and the pair left the store and out onto the bustling city street. “I’m starting to see where Yang gets her attitude from.” Weiss commented dryly as the two paused briefly outside the shop to button up their coats. 

“You’re… not entirely wrong.” Blake admitted, pulling her hair out from under her scarf. “Abrasive is one of the nicer words I’ve heard used to describe Raven.”

“At least she cares about her kids.” Weiss muttered under her breath as she started down the street in the direction of her motel, Blake tagging along after her.

“That she does.” The pair walked in silence for a while, dodging between pedestrians, until Blake broke the silence. “So, what happened with you and your dad?”

Weiss stiffened and her step stuttered a little before she continued on purposefully. “I’d rather not discuss it with someone I only just met.” She told Blake brusquely, shoving her hands into her coat pockets for warmth.

“Mmmm, yeah, I get that, I certainly wouldn’t feel like airing my family issues with someone I met about an hour ago either.” Falling silent again, the pair left the main city centre and started heading towards the outskirts, the sort of area Weiss would never have gone to before her flight.

“Is there a reason you’re walking with me? Do you live this way?” She asked Blake, who snorted with laughter.

“I’m just making sure you get back to wherever you’re staying safe and sound. I actually live in kinda the opposite direction.”

“You don’t have to come with me, I’ll be fine.” Weiss shuffled uncomfortably at the idea of Blake seeing the conditions she was living in, especially since Blake seemed to have some idea of who she was, or used to be anyway.

“A waif like you, wandering around this part of town? Yeah, I’m not leaving you til you’re at wherever you’re staying.” Weiss opened her mouth to protest further, but Blake cut her off. “And before you say anything about me, I’ll be fine walking back on my own. I’m a lot tougher than I look.”

“If you say so.” Weiss said doubtfully. Blake wasn’t much taller than her, but she definitely wasn’t waifish like Weiss was. Chubby was probably a more accurate descriptor. The two kept walking for another few minutes before they came to a halt outside the cheap motel Weiss had been staying at for the last couple of weeks.

“You’re staying here?” Blake couldn’t quite keep a note of horror out of her voice as she looked at the motel.

“I didn’t exactly leave with much to my name. It’s mostly in my father’s name, held in trust and the like.”

“But, you’re like 23, right? Same age as me and Yang.”

“Yeah, it’s complicated, old contracts I signed a while ago, worded to confuse.” Weiss shrugged helplessly. It had taken her months to get to this point, going through her contract to find out how to break it in the safest way possible.

“I guess things weren’t so idyllic for the Schnee Songbird after all.” Weiss rolled her eyes at the old nickname. “So, what are ya gonna do until tomorrow?”

“I don’t know, probably just mess around with my synth for a while, get my ear in for the recording session.” Weiss shrugged, it wasn’t like she had much else she could do, she had no internet connection with her phone contract being cut off less than a day after she’d left.

“Wait, you have a synth in there with you? What kind?”

“Just a Moog One. Nothing fancy.” Weiss figured she’d said something rather foolish by the way Blake’s jaw dropped.

“Nothing fancy?! Girl, that thing’s worth at least a few thousand dollars, and you’re keeping it here?!” Blake gesticulated wildly at the motel.

“I mean, it’s not just the One I’m keeping here. It’s also my violin, my flute…” Weiss trailed off as she realised she was not helping her case as Blake’s jaw continued to hang.

“Okay, yeah, no. You are not staying here with that much expensive shit. You’re crashing at my place.” Blake started marching towards the rooms, forcing Weiss to chase after her.

“Wait, what?!”

“You heard me, you’re just begging to get robbed and murdered.” Blake paused in the middle of the car park. “Um, where’s your room?”

“It’s just this way.” Weiss groaned, taking the lead and climbing the stairs up to the second floor. “You really don’t have to do this, I can’t exactly pay rent or anything, that’s why I’m staying here for now.”

“Look, you’re struggling, I remember what that was like before I got my relatively steady income stream.” Blake said as she followed Weiss to one of the battered doors. “So this is me helping out someone else in a rough spot.” Realising she wasn’t going to argue her way out of this, Weiss sighed in defeat and opened up the door to her room.

It was nothing to write home about, unless one was in the habit of writing about how bad accommodations could be. Suspicious stains on the walls and the faint scent of cigarette smoke that still lingered after someone had ignored the very clearly placed no smoking sign.

Stacked in a neat pile in the far corner of the room were a few instrument cases and a small suitcase that was easily dwarfed by the largest of the cases, which held her synth.

“You certainly have your priorities straight.” Blake snarked as she entered the room after Weiss and looked at her belongings. “You seriously brought all these instruments with you but only one suitcase?”

“I didn’t have a lot of time once I broke my contract.” Weiss huffed, walking over and starting to pick up her things. “And I figured at least I could maybe sell the instruments if I got desperate.”

“Well, that makes at least some sense.” Blake admitted with a wry smile, moving over to help Weiss and grabbing the synth case. “Yeesh, this thing must weigh a ton. How are you still so scrawny if you had to haul this thing around?”

“I didn’t, it normally just lived in my room.” Weiss explained as she managed the careful balancing act of picking up her other instrument cases and grabbing her suitcase. “I guess I should just hand in the keys and check out, then head to your place?”

“Sounds like a plan.” Leading the way, Blake struggled to get Weiss’ synth out of the room without bashing it against anything. Weiss locked the door behind them and together they hefted the payload down the stairs and over to the front office.

One short conversation later, Weiss and Blake were on the move again, heading back towards the centre of the city. “I take it you live in an apartment, then?” Weiss asked. if she was going to be staying at Blake’s place, she may as well be friendly.

“Yeah. Rent’s a little higher than I’d like, but the area is safe.”

“I do have some cash I can give you. It’s not much… but-.” Weiss’ offer was cut short by a tutting from Blake.

“No, you aren’t paying me anything until you’ve got at least a job. A proper one too, not just you mixing an EP for us.” She put down firmly and glared at Weiss when she opened her mouth to argue again.

“Thanks.” She finally mumbled once she was sure Blake wouldn’t stop her from speaking. “I’m not used to people being nice to me without wanting something in return.”

“People suck.” Blake said rather succinctly, and Weiss nodded in agreement. The two made idle conversation as they walked through the city, evening slowly drawing in and the streetlights blinking into life as Blake led the way to a tall apartment building.

“Well, here we are.” Blake keyed in a code to the lobby door and held it open for Weiss who slipped gratefully into the warmth. The lobby was brightly lit and clean, not quite as nice as Weiss had been used to, but far far better than her previous accommodations. Both lifts appeared to be working too, and Blake and Weiss both entered one of them and Blake hit the button for the fourth floor. Soon enough, they emerged onto the fourth floor corridor and Blake set down the synth case to pull out a door key.

“You’re lucky I have a spare room, or ‘place I stick all my junk’, so you won’t be forced to sleep on the sofa.” Blake commented as Weiss shut the door behind her and looked around the apartment. It was pretty small, the living room and the kitchen adjoined and there wasn’t space for a proper table to eat at. Still, it was practically palatial compared to the motel.

“You have a bed in there?”

“Yeah, I… used to sleep in there before I started sleeping in the room I’m currently in.” Blake’s answer sounded rather evasive, but Weiss decided not to pry into the affairs of someone whose charity she was relying on. Shrugging, Weiss followed Blake down a short corridor and into a room that did indeed live up to the name ‘place I stick all my junk.’ The room was filled with books and various bits and pieces, Weiss was sure she saw at least two amplifiers tucked away in a corner, and every available surface was covered in books.

“It’s a bit of a mess, but feel free to make yourself at home.” Weiss nodded in gratitude, setting down her things as Blake set down her synth and moved over to the door. “I’m just gonna drop my stuff off and get changed. I’ll call you when dinner’s ready.”

“No, no, no. You can’t feed me as well.” Weiss tried to insist, but once again Blake shook her head.

“Nope, I am feeding you and that’s the end of the discussion.” With that, she left the room and Weiss heard another door open and shut. Sighing, Weiss walked over to the bed and flopped down on it.

Despite a few slip ups earlier and Yang’s stand-offishness, Weiss really did seem to have landed on her feet here. Though she did have to wonder, how long would her luck hold out for?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun times ahead, lots of fun! I have lots of plans for the future of this fic. In the meantime, Blake's being super accommodating to Weiss, as she said, it's punk to be kind. Non-trauma Blake is interesting to write and I have a few ideas for her characterisation here.
> 
> I've set up a [discord](https://discord.gg/4t3y25e) so feel free to join and stuff, I'm pretty active there these days.
> 
> Big thanks to [machiavellianFictionist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/machiavellianFictionist) for proofreading and knowing way more about music stuff than I do. Lots of thanks too to my lovely girlfriend [Ruby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RubyAndNanaAO3) for beta reading and being just the greatest.
> 
> Thank you too to my official supporters, send a PM or hop on the discord server for details.


	3. Chapter 3

It took Weiss all of ten minutes to settle into her new accommodation and run out of things to do. Back before she’d left, most of her time was spent rehearsing and practising for her next performance. Now that she didn’t have that to do anymore, she was at a loss. Again, that small voice spoke at the back of her mind, asking if it had been worth it throwing away such a lucrative and fulfilling career doing something she loved for such a trivial thing.

Well, it was too late to go back now. Lying back on her bed, Weiss stared up at the ceiling and tried to occupy her mind. She really needed to do something about getting a new sim or a tablet, or at least something to connect her to the internet. Who knew how much she’d missed in the last couple of weeks of being cut off from it.

Sighing, Weiss rolled off the bed and began inspecting the items Blake had shoved into the room. Despite it being a junk room, it was meticulously clean, not a single speck of dust to be found. Weiss took some time to examine the titles of the various books and was surprised to find a great many of them appeared to be legal texts. The few that weren’t ran the gamut of various genres of fiction and appeared to have no ordering system.

Weiss considered cracking a book open, but decided against it. Instead she wandered out of the room, having pretty much exhausted all her activities in there, and made her way into the living room. Blake appeared to still be in her bedroom, leaving the living room empty, so Weiss walked over to the sofa and sat down on it, looking around the room.

She was reasonably pleased to see that Blake had a TV, but there wasn’t much else in the room other than Blake’s bass and an amp. Weiss had expected to see a variety of band posters affixed to the wall, but they were bare save for a single photograph.

Getting up, Weiss wandered over to look at the photo. She recognised a slightly younger Blake in the middle of two older people who looked similar enough to her that she assumed they were her parents. The Blake in the picture wore a gown and cap and was smiling very broadly for someone as unemotive as the bassist seemed to be.

Smiling a little, Weiss made her way back over to the sofa and slumped down. She didn’t want to invade Blake’s privacy, and so she had very little to do. With a sigh, Weiss shuffled around so that she was splayed fully over the sofa, something she’d never be allowed to do at her father’s house, but she figured Blake wouldn’t mind.

With nothing else she could think of to do, Weiss closed her eyes and tried to sleep. She could just about hear Blake moving around in her room through the fairly thin walls, but she paid it no mind. The sofa was somehow comfier than the bed back at the motel, and it wasn’t long before Weiss drifted off.

* * *

A loud bang jerked Weiss from her sleep and she fell to the floor with a thump. Groaning in pain, she sat up. She’d just been having a lovely dream about Ruby and her abs, her imagination filling in the bits she hadn’t seen yet. Looking around for the source of the noise that had awakened her just before the good bit, Weiss’ gaze settled on a very unexpected sight.

Well, it was reasonably expected in that it was Blake, but what was entirely unexpected about it was that she was completely naked.

Weiss was unable to tear her eyes away from the sight, and the first word that sprang to mind was ‘soft’ as her gaze raked over Blake’s plush thighs and tummy. Unfortunately, it was at that moment, Blake seemed to realise there was someone else in the apartment with her and she let out a shriek of alarm.

“Weiss!” With a loud yelp she dove for a blanket that hung over the back of the sofa and snatched it up, covering herself with it.

“Shit, fuck, sorry!” Jolted out of her naked woman induced stupor, Weiss blushed bright crimson and covered her eyes. “I’m so so sorry. I should just go.” Weiss made to get up and run out the apartment, too mortified to even think clearly about what she was doing, but was stopped by a call from Blake.

“Weiss, wait.” She paused, hand hovering over the door handle. “It’s my fault, I should’ve remembered it was you who was here.”

“I was the one who was staring. That’s on me, and we barely know each other.”

“I’d actually be mildly offended you didn’t stare.” Blake snorted, trying to inject some levity into the awkward situation. “I wasn’t quite sure, even after I caught you staring at Ruby earlier, but that just kinda sealed the deal. I’m kinda surprised though, after your thing with Neptune I was sure you were straight.”

Weiss flinched a little at the reminder of the final straw between her and her father. “It’s complicated.” She mumbled, though she did feel calm enough that she realised fleeing the apartment was a terrible idea.

“Oh, sorry for bringing it up.” Weiss dared to take a glance at Blake, and was relieved to see she was all covered up with the blanket.

“It’s okay.” Weiss shuffled uncomfortably on the spot. “This still feels pretty awkward. Don’t you feel awkward?”

“Eh, people I barely know seeing me naked ain’t exactly a new thing for me.” Blake shrugged nonchalantly. “Though I’m normally more prepared for it.”

“Still feels weird.” Still mumbling, Weiss cast her gaze down at her feet and tried not to think about Blake’s naked body.

“Well, if you want, you could always get naked. Tit for tit, as it were.” That definitely got Weiss’ attention, and she gaped at Blake.

“What?” She managed to squeak out, certain her face was even redder than before.

“You’re feeling uncomfortable because you’ve seen me naked and that’s created an imbalance in our newly formed friendship, right? So me seeing you naked will even that out.” Weiss continued to gaze incredulously at Blake, who met it evenly with a small smirk playing at the edges of her mouth. Weiss wasn’t sure what was weirder, that Blake had even made the suggestion or that she was actually considering it. Or at least she would be considering it if not for one thing in particular.

“I…” Weiss felt as though her stomach was twisting itself into knots. “How much do you actually know about me?”

“I don’t understand.” Blake cocked her head inquisitively.

“I mean, you recognised me back at the store, and you knew at least something about my career.” Squirming and shuffling her feet against the carpet, Weiss wondered how oblique she could be about this. “So I don’t know whether you know about, y’know, when I used to wear suits?”

Comprehension dawned in Blake’s eyes and she blushed a little. “Oh, that. Yeah, I knew about that.”

“And it doesn’t bother you?”

“Nope.” Blake shrugged nonchalantly. “It won’t bother Ruby or Yang either.”

“I’d rather they didn’t find out.” Weiss reached up to grasp her bicep, forming a sort of shield with her arm. “I’ve spent most of my professional life in circles where everyone knows about it. It’s kind of refreshing to meet people who know next to nothing about me.”

“You do realise that Yang will have looked up everything about you the moment she got home, right?” Blake pointed out and Weiss nodded. Given how protective Yang was of her band, it was unsurprising.

“I’m not ashamed, but... “ She sighed. There was far too much to unpack with this, and Weiss wasn’t sure she wanted to do it with someone she’d only met today. “It’s complicated.”

“Things often are.” Blake shrugged again, moving around to sit on the sofa, pulling the blanket underneath her before she sat down. “But you being trans isn’t a problem. Not to imply that it ever could be, but you know.”

“Yeah, I understand.” Weiss felt rather awkward continuing to stand whilst Blake was sitting down, so she walked over and joined her on the sofa, though she still left a conspicuous gap between herself and the mostly naked woman.

There was a slightly tense silence between the two for a few moments before Blake spoke again. “I was mostly joking about you stripping down, just so you know.”

“I didn’t, actually.” Weiss admitted with a light blush. “I don’t intend to though. I mean, I’m not that kind of girl.”

“If you don’t want to, that’s alright with me.” Blake shrugged, accidentally dislodging her blanket and forcing her to make a quick snatch for it. “I’d definitely enjoy it though. You’re pretty cute.”

That definitely set Weiss blushing hard and she started to stammer out something, but was interrupted by a phone buzzing on the coffee table. Picking it up, Blake checked the caller ID and groaned loudly.

“One sec, I need to take this.” Getting up from the sofa, Blake answered the call and made her way back to her room. “Hey, Dad, what have I done to earn your disapproval this time?” Weiss couldn’t hear Blake’s father’s response to her snarky comment, but whatever it was, it had clearly irked her as she snapped back. “For the last time dad, I’m not stopping!” Weiss watched as Blake stalked away and into her room, slamming the door behind her.

Weiss remained seated on the sofa for a couple of minutes, unsure of what to do. It was oddly gratifying to find out that Blake seemed to have a strained relationship with her own father. She didn’t have long to think about it, however, as Blake emerged from her room in a huff, thankfully having put on some clothes in the meantime. Unfortunately for Weiss, said clothes were a pair of short shorts and a crop top that seemed to show off Blake’s boobs more than her being naked had.

“Sorry about that. Dad likes to call me every so often to let me know how disappointed he is in me.” She huffed, stalking into the kitchen and throwing open the fridge.

“Is everything okay?” Weiss asked, getting up to join Blake in the kitchen as she pulled some things out of the fridge.

“Yeah, I’ll be fine.” Blake paused to take a deep calming breath. “I just wish he’d learn to respect my boundaries, ya know?”

“Yeah…” Weiss knew all too well what it could be like to have an invasive father. “Do you need a hand with dinner?”

“Please.” Blake tossed a bag of bread over at Weiss. “It’s nothing fancy, just grilled cheese. Nothing like the stuff you’re used to.”

“You seem to forget I’ve been living in a crappy motel for the last couple of weeks.” Weiss reminded Blake with a grimace. “I think I’m used to no longer eating caviar and lobster.” Blake snorted with laughter as she grabbed a chopping board and unwrapped a block of cheese.

“You’re pretty funny, you’ll fit right in.”

“Somehow I doubt that’ll happen, if Yang has anything to say about it.” Weiss sighed sadly, taking out the bread and beginning to butter it. “Besides, I’m only mixing this one EP for you guys. Once that’s over, I’ll be out of your hair.”

“Oh I’m pretty sure that’s not happening.” Smirking, Blake finished slicing the cheese and started gesturing to Weiss with the knife. “Since you’re crashing here for the foreseeable future and Yang and Ruby are round here quite a bit, and that’s not even mentioning the shine Summer’s taken to you.”

“She just feels sorry for me since she recognised me.” Weiss mumbled, handing the bread over to Blake so she could construct the sandwiches.

“Yeah, she’s something of a bleeding heart for young women in trouble. I bet she offered you a job at the store too.” Blake’s smirk widened into a grin as Weiss stared at her.

“How did you know that?”

“Because she offered me the same job a few years ago when I was fresh out of high school and needed the cash.” She pulled a frying pan out of one of the cupboards. “I quit after I got my current job, but Summer’s always been like that, helping people out.”

“Always?” Weiss brought the chopping board with the assembled sandwiches over to the counter beside the hob where Blake was heating up the frying pan. “You’ve known her for a long time, then?”

“I’ve been going to their store for years now, ever since I picked up the bass.” Blake took the sandwiches and dropped them in the pan. “My parents thought it would be good for me to learn an instrument to ‘broaden my horizons’.”

“I take it they didn’t envision you becoming a professional musician, then? Oh and where are the plates?”

“They’re in that cupboard over there, and no they definitely did not.” Blake gestured before flipping the sandwiches to brown on the other side as Weiss pulled out the plates. “But hey, I’m doing something I enjoy, and even if I’m not making a ton of money, it’s enough to get by.”

“If it’s enough for you to live on, then surely that’s all that matters.” Shrugging, Blake flipped the sandwiches out onto the plates.

“I mean, it should, but I bet you’re no stranger to parental expectations either.” Weiss didn’t really have an answer for that, so she inclined her head and took her plate back over to the sofa to sit down, Blake joining her a few moments later and sitting right beside her.

As Weiss ate her sandwich, she tried to ignore how the skin of Blake’s soft thigh pressed up against her own, and silently cursed how short her skirt was. Blake was making small happy hums as she devoured her sandwich, seemingly unaware of the effect she was having on Weiss.

“I have no idea why anyone would dislike grilled cheese.” Blake commented in between licking her fingers clean. “It’s got all you could ever want. Except tuna.”

“I don’t think tuna really goes with cheese.” Weiss pointed out as she finished her own sandwich and got up, taking Blake’s plate as well and carrying it over to the sink.

“You’re right… well, actually, tinned tuna isn’t bad with cheddar. Could make a tuna melt, but I’d need a panini press or something for that, and I’m not bougie enough to buy one of those.”

“I’m fairly certain panini presses aren’t ‘bougie’.” Weiss flashed Blake a sceptical look as she washed up and received a snort of laughter in response.

“Yang would probably say it is if she ever found out I had one.” She chuckled and rolled her eyes.

“Yang is rather opinionated, isn’t she?” Weiss ventured tentatively, not wanting to accidentally upset Blake by insulting Yang.

“Oh, tell me about it, she’s my best friend and I lo-.” Blake paused and coughed before continuing. “Well, I’ve known her for a long time, and yeah, I get that she can be pretty abrasive, but her heart’s in the right place. I mean, you saw how she’s there for Ruby.”

Weiss did have to concede that point about Yang, and Raven for that matter. Both of them did just seem to be protective rather than just unpleasant people. Hopefully, she’d be able to get past that if she was going to be living with Blake for a while, and maybe working for Raven and Summer. Speaking of which…

“You said you used to work at the store?” She asked Blake, shaking the water off her hands and turning to face Blake whilst the clean plates sat in the drying rack.

“Yeah, full-time for about a year or so, then part-time until a couple of months ago. You thinking of taking Summer up on her offer?”

“Probably. I haven’t exactly got many prospects right now and I’m sure working there won’t be so bad.” Weiss shrugged before grabbing a tea towel and starting on the drying up. “Also, I want to start paying you back as soon as I can for letting me live here.”

“I don’t mind how long you take for that.” Blake waved her hand dismissively. “And I’m sure you’ll fit in fine at the store. You’re pretty much a shoe-in for the job.” She looked around furtively and lowered her voice, even though no one was around to listen. “Just between you and me, they could do with someone like you.”

“What do you mean someone like me?” Weiss tried to think of what set her apart from the others, but all she could think of was the fact that she had a dick, and she was fairly certain Blake wasn’t referring to that.

“A classical musician.” Oh, that made a lot more sense. “Raven and Summer are great and all, but they haven’t got an ounce of classical training between them. Raven can’t even read sheet music. So whenever a kid comes in looking for advice on tuning their violin or whatever, they’re no help at all.”

“Well, I do know how to tune violins.” Weiss smiled, finishing drying up and setting the tea towel aside. “I guess I could put my extensive knowledge of violins to use.”

“Oh yeah, you’re definitely going to fit in.” Blake smiled widely before stretching out. “Well, I hate to leave ya, but I’ve been up since like five this morning and I am beat. I’m headed to bed, see ya in the morning.”

“Sleep well.” Weiss called to her new roomie, trying not to stare at Blake’s ass as she left the living room. Sighing softly, Weiss leaned up against the kitchen counter. She couldn’t tell if it was good or bad fortune that she’d somehow ended up sharing an apartment with a very hot girl who she’d already managed to see naked. Either way, at least she had a place to stay, and maybe a job. It was something, at least, in her impromptu quest for freedom, and she had no intention of quitting now that things were looking up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, naked Blake is a thing. We're just diving right into the horny stuff aren't we? Honestly, writing Blake and Weiss is one of my favourite things to do, they bounce off each other well and it's especially interesting with non-trauma Blake here. Oh yeah, also trans!Weiss, mostly because I can and also it wouldn't be a 'me' story if there wasn't a trans character floating around.
> 
> I've set up a [discord](https://discord.gg/4t3y25e) so feel free to join and stuff, I'm pretty active there these days.
> 
> Big thanks to [machiavellianFictionist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/machiavellianFictionist) for proofreading and being the best. Lots of thanks too to my lovely girlfriend [Ruby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RubyAndNanaAO3) for beta reading and providing plenty of inspiration for this.
> 
> Thank you too to my official supporters, send a PM or hop on the discord server for details.


	4. Chapter 4

Weiss was woken up early the next morning by a loud crashing noise above her, accompanied by a lot of swearing. Groaning loudly, Weiss rolled out of bed and walked sluggishly to the door. Wandering into the main area of the apartment, Weiss was surprised to see that Blake hadn’t emerged yet with the racket going on up above.

Resigned to her fate, Weiss sat down on the sofa and grabbed the remote and turned on the TV. She idly flipped through the channels before finally settling on a banal morning show. She watched as the host rambled on about Neopolitan’s latest smash hit and her upcoming tour.

Weiss rolled her eyes. Neopolitan wasn’t that good of a singer. Weiss had actually met her once, Schnee Records had tried to poach her and had invited her to one of the lavish parties. The pop singer had been rather arrogant about her success in comparison to Weiss, and ultimately refused her father’s offer of a contract.

Letting the mindless droning about how amazing and talented Neo was wash over her and drown out the loud thumps from upstairs, Weiss slumped back on the sofa and stared up at the ceiling, wishing she could go back to sleep. Her sleep had been disturbed by several lurid and vivid dreams about Blake. Much as she wanted to respect Blake’s modesty, Weiss was unable to banish the memory of her naked body.

Weiss hoped that after that initial embarrassing encounter Blake would remember to wear clothing around the apartment, but she had the weird feeling that she probably wouldn’t. For someone to just wander around their apartment naked, it was almost certainly an ingrained habit of theirs.

The hosts had finally finished gushing over Neopolitan and had moved onto some other equally dull news story. It was mindless drivel, but that was exactly what Weiss wanted right now. She needed to think of what she was going to do today before the recording session that afternoon. She wanted to practise with her instruments to help get her ear in, but given the racket that was still going on upstairs, the soundproofing in these apartments was obviously inadequate.

She could possibly go out to the music store early and ask Summer about that job she’d offered. It was the best offer she’d gotten so far. With her qualifications, she’d hoped she could get a reasonable position at some recording studio, but nobody had wanted her. Sure, they’d been interested in her qualification and skills, but the moment her name was mentioned, they’d cease contact.

If Weiss didn’t know any better, she might think that her father had used his considerable resources to blacklist her. Who was she kidding? Of course he’d done that. Weiss wasn’t sure how he’d done so without tarnishing his squeaky clean image, but he was certainly vindictive enough. All this over some stage romance too.

That hadn’t been a pleasant conversation. In fact, that was an understatement, screaming match would have been more appropriate. The only one she could think of that was worse was shortly after she’d come out as trans and her father had insisted she start wearing dresses for her performances, rather than the suits she’d loved.

Weiss was distracted from her thoughts of her father by the sound of a door opening. As soon as she heard it, Weiss immediately closed her eyes and covered them with a hand. “Blake, if that’s you, please be wearing something.”

There was a low chuckle then a reply. “I’m not naked, Weiss. You can look.” Tentatively, Weiss peeked out with one eye and was somewhat relieved to see Blake was indeed not naked. She was less reassured by the fact that what Blake was wearing hardly counted as clothes.

A tank top that had ridden up, which Blake clearly had no intention of rectifying coupled with perhaps the shortest shorts Weiss had ever seen. Nothing was left to the imagination, not that Weiss needed to use it, knowing exactly what was beneath the thin scraps of fabric.

Resigning herself to her fate, Weiss lowered her hand and watched Blake wander into the kitchen. Weiss tried very hard not to stare at Blake’s ass, but it was an impossible task, since Blake elected to bend over at the waist to inspect the contents of the fridge. As Weiss continued to question what was happening to her whilst pointedly looking away, Blake called out to her.

“You want eggs for breakfast, Weiss?”

“Please.” Weiss tried to keep her voice steady as Blake emerged from the fridge with a carton of eggs and closed it with a bump from her hip.

“So, what are you going to do this morning?” She asked conversationally as she grabbed the bread and tossed a few slices into the toaster.

“I’m not sure yet. I was thinking of heading into the music store this morning to see about that job.”

“Not a bad idea. I could come with if you’d like.” Blake offered as she retrieved a frying pan from a cupboard and started heating it up. After a moment’s debate, Weiss got up and entered the kitchen to help out, pulling plates out and hunting around for some cutlery.

“Don’t you have work?” Weiss asked, finally finding the cutlery in a drawer and pulling out some knives and forks.

“I… have a pretty flexible work schedule, but I normally work in the evenings.” Blake’s answer sounded oddly evasive and Weiss was tempted to probe further, but refrained from doing so. Instead she opted for a more benign question.

“Are you a heavy sleeper, then?” Blake turned away from the frying eggs to give Weiss a curious look.

“Why do you ask?”

“Weren’t you woken up by all the noise earlier?” Weiss pointed up at the ceiling where a loud thump further reinforced her point.

“Oh! I didn’t hear it, I’ve soundproofed my room.” Blake laughed, returning her attention to the eggs. “You want yours sunny side up or broken yolk?”

“Broken, please. And why did you do that?” Blake laughed again.

“I play a musical instrument, Weiss. You’ve heard first hand how crappy the soundproofing in these apartments is, so I got some foam for cheap and stuck it all over the walls and ceiling.” She explained as she grabbed a spoon and drizzled some of the hot oil over her egg.

“You’re allowed to do that?” Weiss raised an eyebrow and Blake shuffled uncomfortably.

“Well, there wasn’t any rule that said I couldn’t put up soundproofing.”

“I don’t think that’s how rules work...” Blake winced and turned away to grab the toast and drop it on the plates.

“Yeah, well, please don’t tell the landlord. Also, I don’t think you can anyway, since  _ technically _ I’m not supposed to have roommates or whatever.” Stunned for a moment, Weiss watched blankly as Blake flipped the eggs out on the plates and picked them up to carry into the living room.

“Hold on, I’m staying here illegally?”

“Well, if you want to get technical about it it’s more a breach of contract on my part, so you’re not actually doing anything illegal per se.” Blake set the plates down on the coffee table and settled in to eat her breakfast. “I mean, you’ll get kicked out, but that’s about the worst that can happen to you.”

“Such a weight off my mind.” Weiss drawled, joining Blake and digging into her breakfast.

“You’re welcome.” Blake smirked before taking a large bite of eggy toast. “So, you want me to come with?”

“If you wouldn’t mind. I don’t actually know the way to the store from here.” Weiss confessed with an embarrassed grin.

“I’ll be your guide, then.” Blake declared graciously, finishing her breakfast and laying her knife and fork down neatly on the plate. “I can be ready to head out pretty much whenever you want.”

“Let me just wash this stuff up and have a shower, then I can be ready to go.” Weiss finished her breakfast too and stood up, collecting the plates. 

“I should probably take a shower as well, actually.” Blake got up from the sofa and started back toward their rooms and the bathroom. “I’ll be quick.” Nodding in agreement, Weiss carried the plates into the kitchen and began washing up. She heard the shower start down the corridor and tried not to imagine Blake naked with water dripping down her plush curves.

Weiss quickly finished off the washing up and quickly dried up before heading into her room to gather some clothes. She spent a little while inspecting them, trying to work out which would be best for making a good impression on Summer and Raven. Ever since she’d transitioned, her wardrobe had exclusively consisted of fancy dresses without a pocket in sight. Of course, a couple of weeks of doing her own laundry at a nearby laundromat had left her clothes less than pristine.

Then again, given the atmosphere of the store, perhaps looking a little worse for wear would be more appropriate. Eventually settling on a slightly rumpled white dress and grabbing her towel and the cheap soap and shampoo she’d picked up, Weiss sat on the bed waiting until she heard the shower shut off.

She gave it a couple of minutes, she heard the bathroom door open and Blake’s room door shut, just in case. Satisfied she’d given Blake enough time, Weiss emerged from her room just as Blake’s own door opened and the dark-haired girl came running out, crashing right into Weiss.

“Shit! Sorry, I left my phone in there.” Blake apologised, but Weiss wasn’t paying too much attention to that. She was more concerned with how Blake was still dripping wet and clad only in a towel. With a sheepish grin, Blake darted into the bathroom, the hem fluttering around her thighs, and emerged a few seconds later brandishing her phone. “Got it, sorry.” With another smile, Blake slipped back into her room, leaving behind a stunned and awkwardly aroused Weiss.

As quickly as she could, Weiss ran into the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind her and locking it. With a small whine, Weiss collapsed back against the door and slid down it to the floor. She could feel the heat in her cheeks and she wondered whether some deity was conspiring against her. It was like she’d somehow ended up in some kind of porno or somthing. Real life wasn’t supposed to have nearly naked women wandering around the place.

Yet this was her life now, it seemed, and now Weiss was uncomfortably aroused. Sighing deeply, Weiss got to her feet and hung up her clothing and towel on the rack before shedding her pyjamas. She paused in front of the mirror before getting in the shower and examined herself.

Weiss had always been a little disappointed that the hormones she’d been taking hadn’t given her more assets. She was just barely an A cup and had pretty much no hips to speak of. She was actually more than a little envious of Blake’s curves. Not that she minded having a boyishly slim figure, but it would be nice to have more than just her long hair and dresses to indicate her femininity.

Sighing, Weiss climbed into the small shower cubicle and turned it on, letting the water cascade over her. After the motel, it was wonderful to have a shower with reasonable water pressure. Closing her eyes and letting the water run over her face for a while, Weiss reached out blindly for where she’d absently placed her shampoo, only to grasp something oddly rubbery.

No, surely not.

Opening her eyes and looking down at what she’d grabbed, Weiss’ fears were confirmed that hidden in amongst Blake’s hair products was a large purple dildo. It was official, Weiss had somehow stumbled into a porno. It was the only explanation for why Blake would wander around naked and have a fucking dildo in the shower.

She half-expected to find a dozen spycams all pointed at her or something, it seemed nothing was too ridiculous at this point. Even worse, Weiss for some reason hadn’t let go of the dildo and if she’d thought she’d been aroused before, she’d been sorely mistaken.

Normally she required at least a little stimulation to get hard, but it seemed the unbidden fantasy of Blake leaning up against the shower wall and thrusting the dildo into herself was more than enough.

“No, stop it!” She hissed, as though talking to her half-hard dick would make any sort of difference. Of course, it didn’t, and Weiss was left staring down at her stubbornly uncooperative anatomy. It didn’t matter how attractive she thought Blake was, Weiss absolutely should not be lusting after her, not when she was in such a tenuous living situation that relied upon Blake’s mercy.

Weiss tried to will herself to calm down as the water continued to fall upon her, and she considered turning the temperature down and doing it by force. Her attempts to think of unsexy things were foiled by Blake’s naked form slipping past her mind’s eye.

“Fine! Fine!” She hissed, giving up on ignoring this, if this was what things were going to be like, then she may as well enjoy herself.

Reaching down tentatively, Weiss grasped her dick and gave it a couple of experimental rubs. It had been a while since she’d indulged in this, and the feeling of her cool hand around herself was a welcome feeling. It only took a couple more strokes for her to reach full hardness, and she gasped in pleasure as she swiped a finger over the now fully exposed head.

Closing her eyes and letting her head drop so the water ran down her back, Weiss imagined Blake on her knees in front of her, running calloused fingers over her sensitive length. Weiss was just about able to stifle her small squeaks of pleasure when she remembered how bad the soundproofing was. It would be so embarrassing if Blake heard her.

Maybe she’d be turned on by it though. Weiss let out a muffled groan as she let her imagination run wild, picturing Blake playing with herself as she listened to Weiss jerking off, teasing her large breasts and pinching her nipples with one hand whilst the other snaked down over her pudgy tummy and between her thighs.

‘You like watching me, Weiss?’ Imagination Blake asked, and Weiss whimpered, hand speeding up whilst the other rested on the wall to support her as her knees buckled. It felt like she’d been teased into a state of bubbling arousal ever since she’d set foot in the apartment, and she was finally getting her much needed release.

Imagination Blake continued to titillate Weiss, by now raising one hefty boob up so she could lick at her own nipple all whilst smiling seductively up at the panting and desperate Weiss.

“Oh, Blake, Fuck!” Weiss gasped out, hand flying up and down her cock now. She didn’t know how long she’d been at this, but she needed to finish soon before real Blake started wondering what was taking her so long.

‘Give me your cum, Weiss, please.’ Imagination Blake pleaded, crawling to sit just below Weiss’ cock, tongue lolling out eagerly. ‘Cum over me!’ The pressure in Weiss’ cock was growing unbearable and after a couple more pumps, Weiss came with a high pitched moan.

In her imagination, Blake was plastered with several ropes of sticky white cum. In reality, Weiss had been on hormones for long enough that all she produced was a small dribble of clear liquid that was quickly washed away.

Panting for breath, Weiss opened her eyes as the imaginary Blake she’d just masturbated to drifted away and was replaced with a tight guilty feeling in her chest. She shouldn’t have done that. Blake was just a friend, a friend she’d known for less than a day and had opened up her home to her.

Weiss quickly finished showering, skipping her hair as it took forever to clean properly, and hopped out. Towelling herself off roughly, the cheap material scratching at her like a sort of penance, Weiss threw on her clothes and left the bathroom.

She found Blake waiting in the living room, messenger bag swung over her shoulder and bass ready to go as she scrolled through her phone idly. “Oh, cool, you’re done.” She got up from the sofa and picked up her instrument. “You going to need anything from your extensive instrument collection?”

“I don’t think so. I doubt very much Yang would appreciate any changes I suggest to the instrumentation.” Weiss said, unable to quite meet Blake’s eye without remembering what she’d just done in the shower.

“Good point.” Blake conceded with a small smile. “Shall we get going?”

“One sec.” Weiss quickly ducked into her room to grab her bag and her shoes. “Okay, ready to go.”

“Great.” Blake opened the door and led the way outside. “I’ll probably just fuck around in the store until it’s our slot, I’ve done enough work for this morning.”

“You did work?” Weiss blinked in surprise as they took the stairs down. “I thought you didn’t have any.”

“I don’t have to work, but I got some done whilst you were in the shower.” Blake shrugged, trotting a little ahead of Weiss and leading her out of the lobby.

“I see…” Weiss was getting more and more confused about what Blake’s job could be. She hadn’t been in the shower for that long, had she? What on earth could Blake do for a living that allowed her to dictate her own hours, work from home and do it in only a few minutes? Blake didn’t seem to be any more forthcoming on this though, and Weiss resigned herself to not knowing.

The apartment wasn’t that far from the city centre, and soon the two were weaving between crowds of people as they made their way towards the outskirts, where the less upmarket stores were. As they walked, Weiss looked idly at the adverts they passed and her relatively good mood was soured as she saw the smugly smirking visage of Neopolitan.

Something about her perky pastel palette really grated with Weiss, probably because she knew the Japanese-American singer was very much not like the happy-go-lucky image she presented. Shaking her head, Weiss jogged to catch up with Blake’s surprisingly fast pace and continued trying to memorise their route.

Eventually the pair arrived at Rosebird and Weiss shuffled awkwardly in front of the door. “What’s the problem, Weiss?”

“I don’t know. Will they actually hire me? I get the impression Raven doesn’t like me.”

“I don’t think Raven likes anyone other than Summer and her daughters.” Blake snickered, shaking her head. “Trust me, you’ll be fine. Summer likes you, and you’re more than qualified, so stop worrying and come on.” With a smile and a tug, Blake pulled Weiss onwards into the store.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dildo count: 1
> 
> Somehow in discussions on my discord server, we ended up with a new running gag about dildos and so from now on, there's gonna be a dildo count as we learn about Blake's affection for the masturbatory aids. Also yay, we got smut and it's only gonna get worse from here on out. Really, jerking off in the shower is pretty tame compared to what's lined up for the rest of this fic.
> 
> I've set up a [discord](https://discord.gg/4t3y25e) so feel free to join and stuff, I'm pretty active there these days.
> 
> Big thanks to [machiavellianFictionist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/machiavellianFictionist) for proofreading and being the inspiration for a variety of scenes yet to come. Lots of thanks too to my lovely girlfriend [Ruby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RubyAndNanaAO3) for beta reading and being just the best and most wonderful.
> 
> Thank you too to my official supporters, send a PM or hop on the discord server for details.


	5. Chapter 5

Much like the day before, Raven was seated behind the counter, flipping through a magazine. She looked up at the jingle of the shop bell and smiled at the sight of Blake.

“Hello, Blake. I thought you had the room this afternoon, not this morning.” She turned away to look at a piece of paper taped up on the wall nearby.

“We do. I’m here with Weiss for something else.” Blake nudged Weiss forward, and Raven’s small smile faded at the sight of her and was replaced with a mistrustful frown.

“Oh, I see.” Raven raised an eyebrow at the nervously shuffling Weiss. “And what exactly is this ‘something else’?”

Weiss gulped audibly. She’d hoped that she could deal with Summer and not Raven who was still giving her a very disapproving look. “I-I was hoping I could maybe get a job here as a store assistant?”

Raven’s other eyebrow joined the other. “Oh? I’m afraid we’re not hiring at the moment.” A smug smirk crossed her face. “And even if we were, I’m not sure you’ve got the right qualifications. Do you have a CV or cover letter?” Weiss shook her head and Raven sighed in condescending sadness. “As I thought.”

There was a loud groan from Blake, who pushed her way past Weiss and walked up to Raven. “Raven, is there a particular reason you’re being a bitch today?”

“I thought I was always a bitch.” Raven fired back, her smirk growing wider.

“Yeah, well, you’re being extra bitchy to someone who doesn’t deserve it. Do I need to get Summer?” Raven’s smug smile slipped a little.

“There’s no need to get Summer, I-.”

“Why is there no need to get me?” The familiar voice called out from a backroom and Summer poked her head out. “Hey, Blake. Nice to see you again too, Weiss.” She walked out fully into the room, her attention now on her wife. “Rae-Rae, what did you do this time?”

Both Raven and Blake spoke at the same time.

“Nothing.”

“She was giving Weiss a hard time.” They both glowered at one another whilst Sumer sighed and buried her face in her hand.

“Rae-Rae, just because you’re frustrated doesn’t mean you can take it out on random people.”

“Well, if someone would do her wifely duties, I wouldn’t get so pent up.” Raven fired back and Weiss blushed once she realised what Raven was implying. “You never let me have my fun.”

“You got to have your fun when you went on that road trip, remember?” Raven winced at the mention of this road trip.

“That’s a low blow, Summer.” She grumbled, flushing and crossing her arms. “That was years ago.”

“You’re right, I’m sorry.” Summer apologised, walking up behind her wife and pulling her into a hug. “I was being petty, but you’re being petty with poor Weiss too.”

“Maybe…” Raven huffed, wriggling a little to get comfortable against her wife’s chest. “You still left me hanging last night though.”

“I’m sorry, Rae-Rae, I’ll make it up to you later.” Summer pressed a kiss to Raven’s cheek, then whispered into her ear. “On the subject of wifely duties, I’m pretty sure those are your responsibility, brat.”

“Summer, not in front of the customers.” Raven whined and Weiss’ blush deepened whilst Blake rolled her eyes.

“We both know what Blake does, she’s hardly going to complain.” Summer defended with a pout.

“Blake might not, but I’m pretty sure Miss Schnee would.” As Blake pointed this out, Summer froze in the middle of moving to bite on Raven’s ear and blushed deeply. “Don’t tell me you forgot she was here.”

“I got distracted.” Summer huffed, sliding back from Raven. “You’re very distracting, babe.”

“Good to know I’ve still got it.” Raven preened a little before prodding Summer. “Now, you can deal with Miss Schnee. I want to finish this article. They’re saying Neopolitan secretly married her old manager.”

“Oh, let me see!” Blake skipped over to the counter and peered at the magazine. “I live for this trash.”

Sighing in indulgent amusement, Summer walked out from behind the counter and over to Weiss. “Sorry about that. What was it my darling wife was giving you a hard time over?”

“I, uh, wanted to follow up on that job you mentioned yesterday.” Weiss’ gaze flickered briefly over to Raven, who seemed to be fully engrossed in her magazine again. “If that’s okay.”

“Sure. You wanna come with me into the back? We need to at least have some semblance of professionality.” Summer gestured for Weiss to follow her and after hesitating for a moment, Weiss did. Walking around the desk they went into the backroom Summer had initially come out, Blake flashing Weiss an encouraging smile before the door was closed and Weiss gestured to sit in front of a small desk.

The office was a little drab, like Summer and Raven had spent all their effort on the public areas of the store and not on the private. There were a few posters stuck up on the walls, which Weiss looked at with interest whilst Summer rummaged through the drawers.

Weiss blinked in surprise as she recognised the subjects of one of the posters. It was Summer and Raven, both looking at least a decade or so younger.

“Like it? We didn’t have much merch or anything, but we kept a few things around.” Summer’s voice jerked Weiss out of her thoughts and she sheepishly returned her attention to the older woman.

“You and Raven were in a band?”

“Yep. Didn’t make it very far, sadly, but we’ve got good memories of it. Opening up the store felt like the logical next step after that.” Summer shrugged and shuffled her papers. “Anyway, I’ve just gotta fill out some forms and stuff with you, just to make this official, for tax purposes and shit.”

“Of course.” Weiss nodded and pulled her chair a little closer to the desk as Summer fished out a pen. “What do you need?”

“Not much, just some personal details and proof of identity.” Summer explained, already filling out parts of the form before pausing. “I hate to ask, but your father’s lawyers have been known to be rather… litigious. Do you have any kind of non-compete clauses in your contract?”

“Thankfully not, and even if he did, I don’t think working as a shop assistant counts.” Summer nodded, humming in agreement.

“Can’t be too careful, y’know. Also, don’t tell Raven or the girls, but I was a little concerned about you working as an audio engineer for them might lead to you all getting sued for non-compete things.”

“I won’t say a word.” Weiss reassured with a smile as Summer continued to scribble on the forms with a smile.

“Okay, great.” Summer spoke mostly to herself, chewing on the end of her pen. “You got your ID on you?”

“I think I have my driving license, hold on.” Weiss rummaged around in her bag for a moment as Summer continued talking.

“Right. I’m afraid I can only offer you minimum wage. We aren’t exactly the most… profitable store. I’m sorry.”

“You’re already doing more than enough by offering me the job.” Weiss said as she pulled out her ID and handed it over. Taking the license, Summer reached over to a slightly battered printer and opened the lid. Sliding the license onto the scanner, Summer tapped a couple of buttons as a thought occurred to Weiss. “What will I actually be doing in the store?”

“Oh, well you’ll be working with me and Raven. You’ll put out stock, answer any questions the customers have, take bookings for the practice rooms, man the cash register. The usual sort of store stuff.” Summer had to raise her voice a little as the printer started noisily working and spat out a piece of paper. Handing back the license, Summer took the piece of paper and stapled it to the forms.

“What sort of hours are you offering?” Weiss asked as she tucked her license away.

“Well, pretty much whenever. Raven and I are here all the time anyway, so we can be flexible with your hours. Though I imagine you’ll probably be wanting to do as much as possible.” Summer gave Weiss a knowing look as the young woman nodded with a sheepish grin. “But we can talk that over later. Here, you should read through the contract.” Summer handed the forms over to Weiss who scanned over them quickly. She’d had some practice reading through contracts after scouring through her previous one, and it all looked to be on the up and up as she’d expected.

“Okay, when do I start?” Weiss asked as she signed the contract with a flourish.

“We can get you started on Monday and get a shirt for you then too. But if you want to get acquainted with the store and stuff today whilst waiting for Yang and Ruby to get here, we can do that.” Weiss nodded in agreement, a feeling of relief flooding her. It wasn’t the most glamorous job, but it was something, and she really needed something.

“Thanks for this, Summer. I promise you won’t regret it.” Summer chuckled lightly at the outpouring of gratitude from Weiss as they both got up and walked over to the office door.

“It’s nothing. I’m glad to help, and I’ll never regret being able to do that.” Smiling warmly at Weiss, Summer opened the door and was hit with a barrage of yelling. The two stood, stunned as they took in the shouting match that was taking place.

“Oh, you’ve gotta be fucking kidding me. There’s no way Neopolitan isn’t straight!” Raven was shouting at Blake, who had her arms crossed firmly over her chest. “I’ve got the best gaydar this side of the country.”

“Yeah, a gaydar that’s twenty years out of date and not been put to use ever since you and Summer got together.” Blake fired back, smirking when Raven spluttered indignantly. “Trust in the youth, why don’t you? I’m telling you, that girl’s into women.”

“But she had that whole thing with Mercury last year,  _ and  _ we both read the article about her secret marriage to Torchwick.” Raven jabbed at the article in question, only to get an eye roll in return.

“Being involved with men doesn’t mean she doesn’t like women, and I’m pretty sure your wife would agree with me.” Raven’s irritated huff was interrupted by Summer clearing her throat and looking sternly at the arguing pair.

“Whilst I do agree with Blake on that point, what I don’t agree with is the two of you yelling at each other in the middle of the store. What if there’d been a customer in here? Rae-Rae, I expect it from you, but Blake?”

“I’m sorry, Summer.” Blake mumbled shamefacedly whilst Raven looked similarly guilty. “Won’t happen again, I promise.”

“Good. I don’t want to have to throw you out for a bit because you’re being disruptive. Now, I’d like the two of you to meet Rosebird’s newest employee.” Summer gestured grandiosely at Weiss, who in the absence of anything else to do, raised her hand and gave a quick wave.

“I told you you’d get the job.” Blake said smugly. It was almost enough to make up for the long-suffering sigh that came from Raven.

“Oh goody.” The woman rolled her eyes and received a small flick on the ear from Summer.

“Rae-Rae, you know, you could be more enthusiastic.” Summer chided her wife, some of the playfulness that had previously been there was gone now. “She’s our employee now, you can’t keep being bitchy to her.”

Raven let out a snort and seemed to be trying to remain firm, but folded immediately upon seeing the look Summer was giving her. “Okay, fine. I’ll try to be nicer.”

“Good girl.” Summer leaned in to give Raven a peck on the cheek. “And you can start by showing Weiss around the store and where everything is.”

“Why can’t you do that?” Raven whined, frowning up at her wife.

“Because I need to file Weiss’ contracts and paperwork. Would you rather do that?”

“Nope! It’s all yours.” Raven said hastily, getting up and taking Weiss by the wrist. “Right this way.” Raven pulled Weiss along after her to the far end of the store as Blake and Summer’s laughter followed them, and Weiss was starting to think she might enjoy working here.

* * *

Weiss spent the rest of the morning with Raven as she was given a run down of the store and its inner workings. “Technically, I shouldn’t be doing this until you officially start, buuuuut since I doubt you’ve got anything better to do, we might as well get it out of the way.”

It wasn’t the most complicated to learn, but there was quite a bit to take in. Raven, as it turned out, was very particular about how things were arranged on the shelves, and got rather huffy when she found some of the electronic tuners out of place.

She also spent quite a while trying to get her head around the ordering system they used for stock and the very outdated booking system for the rooms.

“Summer’s not that good with computers.” Raven explained with a smirk as Weiss groaned in frustration at how awful the interface was. “Anything that was made in the last ten years, she has no idea how to use, and she refuses to upgrade.”

Whilst Weiss was learning the ropes, Blake spent her time sitting behind the front counter, messing around on her phone and occasionally looking up to verbally spar with Raven. Initially, Weiss had thought that Blake and Raven just didn’t get along, an impression supported by the fact that Raven didn’t seem to like anyone other than her family. After a few hours of being witness to Blake and Raven’s back and forth, however, Weiss started to get the impression they liked arguing with one another.

They broke for lunch fairly late and Blake took Weiss out to a nearby café. The two ended up fighting for a few minutes over who was paying for Weiss’ bill, until Blake finally gave up on arguing and just let her pay.

“So, what do you think?” Blake asked in between bites of her bacon sandwich.

“It’s good. I like it there.” Weiss smiled, spearing a piece of droopy lettuce and popping it into her mouth. “Thanks for pushing me into going for it.”

“I barely nudged you, you were probably going to go for it anyway.” Blake teased, taking another bite and accidentally getting a smudge of ketchup on her cheek.

“You got a little…” Weiss gestured, and Blake swiped the ketchup off on a finger and popped it in her mouth. Weiss felt a bit of heat rush to her cheeks as Blake extracted her now spit-covered finger with a happy hum, and Weiss wondered how such a simple act could be so sexy.

“Thanks, Weiss.” Blake smiled, seemingly oblivious to the effect she’d just had on Weiss.

“No problem.” Weiss said, trying to sound as normal as possible and covering for herself by shoving another forkful of salad into her mouth. “I should probably sort out a phone or something so they can contact me. I’m also pretty cut off from the world at large too.”

“Not a bad idea. We can see if there’s a place open once we’re done recording and stuff.” Blake suggested, polishing off the last of her sandwich.

“You don’t have to come with me.” Weiss tried to argue, but Blake cut her off.

“I kinda do, since you probably still don’t know how to get back to the apartment and you don’t have a key.” Blake smirked triumphantly as Weiss realised that she was right and deflated a little.

“It feels like you’re doing way too much for me.” She mumbled into her salad, moving the last few leaves of lettuce around the plate. “You let me live at your place rent-free, you’ve fed me, convinced Yang to let me do this job for you guys...”

“It’s nothing, really.” Blake shrugged, draining the last of her coke. “Summer and Raven helped me out when I was in a bit of a rough spot after high school, so this is me paying forward their generosity.”

“It’s still a lot for you to do for me.” Weiss muttered, from what she knew of Raven she sincerely doubted they went as far as opening up their home to Blake.

“Yeah, well, it’s not every day I get to help out a cute girl.” The accompanying wink made Weiss choke on a tomato, and she was forced to hammer hard on her chest to clear her airway. That had to be flirting, there was no way it could be mistaken for anything else, although…

“Oh wow, Weiss, you are so easy to fluster!” Blake giggled, giving Weiss a coy smile. “After last night, I would’ve thought you’d think me calling you cute was pretty blasé.”

“Yes, well.” Weiss coughed as she finished clearing her throat. “I’m not all that used to people calling me cute.”

“Really? What about your thing with Neptune?” Weiss narrowed her eyes a little at Blake.

“For a punk musician, you seem to know an awful lot about my life.”

“I listen to classical music too. Don’t be like Yang and make wild assumptions about people’s music tastes.” Flashing Weiss a small smile as she swirled the last few ice cubes around her glass. “Also, I may have looked you up last night. I wasn’t exactly going to let a complete stranger live with me.”

“Okay, that’s valid.” Weiss nodded. “Though I doubt what you can find online about me will help you very much. Classical musicians aren’t really gossip fodder.”

“Maybe not, but all the LGBTQ news sites like to keep tabs on you.”

“I wish they wouldn’t.” Weiss grumbled, remembering a few of the interviews she’d had to do as well as how they’d inevitably derail to talk about her father’s various pushes for equal rights and ignore her completely. “I’d rather not be held up as some icon of transgender perfection or whatever.”

“Yeah, well, I’m sure there’s people who find you being openly trans inspiring.” Blake cocked her head and Weiss let out a humourless chuckle.

“I was never given much of a choice. Even if I wasn’t nearly as well known back then, there would’ve been no avoiding it.” That wasn’t the real reason Weiss’ transition had been so public, but she felt disinclined to share such private information with Blake just yet.

“Oh right…” Blake looked down into her glass of melting ice and Weiss ate the last few pieces of salad. “It’s nearly two, we should probably head back.” It was a clumsy end to the subject, but Weiss wasn’t complaining. The two got up and left the café, making the short journey back to the store, where Raven was sitting behind the counter, flipping through a fresh magazine.

“Ruby and Yang showed up a couple of minutes ago, they’re just moving Yang’s kit into the large room.” She told them, not really looking up.

“Thanks, Raven.” Blake smiled at the grumpy older woman before darting behind the counter to grab her bass. Together, she and Weiss made their way towards the practice rooms. As they rounded the corner, they nearly bumped into Ruby, who was carrying a snare and squealed at the sight of them.

“Blake, Weiss! You’re here!” She gently set the drum down before launching herself at Blake, wrapping her arms around the bassist’s neck. “We’re just getting set up, then we’ll be ready to start, and it’s going to be amazing!”

“You’re very excited about this, aren’t you, Cookie?” Blake chuckled, wrapping her own arms around Ruby and letting the smaller woman bury her face in her boobs. Weiss blushed at this casual intimacy and looked away pointedly until Ruby withdrew. She was then surprised when Ruby pulled her into a tight hug as well, but she withdrew quickly, her nose wrinkling.

“Did you have salad for lunch?” She asked, and Weiss nodded, frowning in surprise as Ruby withdrew a little further and Blake made a small noise.

“Oh, crap, sorry forgot to tell you. Here, take this.” Blake rummaged in her pockets for a moment before hand Weiss a breath mint. “Ruby can’t stand the smell of vinegar.”

“Oh, okay.” Weiss popped the breath mint in as Ruby frowned sadly.

“I’m sorry, I try not to let it bother me, but there are some smells and sounds and just sensations in general that make me really uncomfortable.” Ruby apologised as Weiss sucked on the breath mint.

“It’s fine, really.” Weiss reassured her, but Ruby shook her head.

“You won’t be saying that when you find out what some of the other things that bother me are.”

“You could just tell me.” Weiss pointed out and Ruby cocked her head.

“Oh, yeah. I mean, I guess I could, but it’s a little long and I don’t know everything that’s going to be on there yet and I don’t want to just give you an incomplete list and-.” Ruby’s rambling was cut off by Blake pacing a firm finger over Ruby’s mouth, which surprisingly quietened her.

“Just tell Weiss some of the basics so she knows what big things to avoid.” She instructed firmly before releasing her hold on Ruby’s mouth and picked up the abandoned snare. “I’m going to give Yang a hand.”

“Okay. Well, there’s vinegar as you know, um, also citrus. Just like, really strong acidic smells, y’know.” Ruby tapped her chin in thought as Blake walked off with the drum. “Velvet, I can’t stand that sort of rough feeling, though I do know a girl named Velvet and she’s alright. Oh, yeah, pretty much any instrument when it’s played badly, like screechy violins and stuff. Exclusively high pitched noises though, anything above E6 I just cannot handle.”

“Okay.” Weiss made a mental note of these things as Ruby hummed.

“I’m pretty sure there’s a big one I’m forgetting, but I can’t quite remember...” She mused to herself until a voice spoke up from behind Weiss.

“You forgot water.” Weiss yelped and spun around to see Yang looming over her. Surprisingly she didn’t seem to be nearly as moody as she had been yesterday, in fact she was smirking playfully at Weiss. Meanwhile Ruby let out a noise of realisation.

“Oh yeah, I forgot that one. Yeah, I hate the feeling of water, especially when it’s cold. It’s just…” Ruby affected a small shudder.

“But if you don’t like how water feels, how do you clean yourself?” Weiss just had to ask, but it was Yang who answered.

“With great difficulty. Either me or Blake will have to wrangler her into the shower.” Yang shook her head. “Honestly, it’s so bad that she refuses to go outside when it’s raining.”

“Yaaaaaang! It’s just so uncomfortable and bad.” Ruby whined. “And it’s not like I like having this sort of thing. I’d rather not have a meltdown when a car splashes me when I’m out on a delivery, but my fucked up head makes me.”

“Your head isn’t fucked up.” Yang said with the air of someone who’d had to say this a great many times. “It just works differently to the rest of us.” Ruby pouted, but didn’t protest. Instead she slipped past Weiss and Yang and headed for one of the rooms.

“I’m gonna finish setting up my stuff.” She told them, leaving Weiss and Yang alone together in the corridor.

“Ruby can get kinda sensitive about her autism.” Yang said quietly, watching after her sister. “And she didn’t have a great day at work today, so could you please be gentle with her today?”

“Of course.” Weiss nodded, still a little baffled at how she was having this civil conversation with Yang that didn’t involve any mean comments from the blonde. “Will she be okay with the recording session?”

“Yeah, she should be fine. Weirdly, she’s a-okay with loud noises so long as it’s not discordant.” Yang shrugged and smiled slightly. “But that’s my baby sis for ya.” This was far too strange, Weiss had to ask.

“Okay, why are you being so nice to me? Yesterday you were fully ready to tear my throat out or something.” There was a pause then Yang giggled a little.

“Oh, after you left yesterday, Ruby told me off a little for being too mean, and I kinda was. It’s not like you’re here to change our music or anything, just give it a bit of polish so it doesn’t sound like shit when recorded.” Yang scratched at the back of her head. “Also I can’t really be that mad at you after finding out you’re also part of the not-cis-terhood.”

“Oh.”

Weiss blinked in surprise and couldn’t help but cast her eyes down Yang’s body and think to herself how well Yang passed. She felt bad for the thought immediately after and subtly flicked herself for it.

“Yeah, so like, solidarity and stuff.” Yang shrugged awkwardly and an uncomfortable silence fell between the two, which was thankfully interrupted by Blake poking her head out of the room.

“You girls coming or what?”

“Yeah, sure.” Yang started towards the room with Weiss in tow. “Let’s make some music.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dildo count: 1
> 
> We get some set up for things to come as poor thirsty Weiss gets thirstier for Blake. Also Yang's starting to warm up at least a little to Weiss which is good, hopefully it'll last. I mean I know it won't, but we can hope. I am also way too happy with the not-cis-terhood joke.
> 
> I've set up a [discord](https://discord.gg/4t3y25e) so feel free to join and stuff, I'm pretty active there these days.
> 
> Big thanks to [machiavellianFictionist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/machiavellianFictionist) for proofreading and being awesome. Lots of thanks too to my lovely girlfriend [Ruby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RubyAndNanaAO3) for beta reading and being hella adorable.
> 
> Thank you too to my official supporters, send a PM or hop on the discord server for details.


	6. Chapter 6

It took Weiss a little while to get accustomed to the free software Yang had on her battered old laptop, but she eventually worked it out. She’d been used to working with the most expensive equipment and software, so this was a bit of a step down, But it was a job, and she always put her all into these things.

Despite a few initial misgivings, they were able to get Yang’s tracks recorded well enough with what Ruby had deemed to be ‘acceptable deviations from the prescribed tempo’. Yang’s more pleasant attitude held out too, and when her recordings were done, she joined Weiss and Ruby in the small partitioned area with a smile whilst Blake took her place in the main area of the room.

“Pretty good, right?” She grinned as Blake got herself set up, put on a pair of headphones borrowed from Ruby and did a quick sound check. The levels looked good to Weiss, so she gave Blake a thumbs up, which was returned as Blake got ready to start playing. Weiss gestured for Yang and Ruby to stay quiet as she turned on the microphone and started up the first recording of Yang’s raucous drumming.

Much like how Yang lived up to the stereotype of a wild drummer, Blake too conformed to the image of a laid back bassist. Her eyes were closed as she plucked at the strings, bobbing her head to the rhythm only she could hear. Weiss couldn’t help but admire her, though it was tinged with guilt after her shower session.

Blake was hot, very hot, and Weiss had no idea what she was going to do about it. And she wasn’t the only one. Ruby was also very pretty, and Weiss was even starting to find Yang attractive now that she wasn’t being quite so sour. Closing her own eyes, Weiss lost herself in the sound of Blake’s playing, and images of the three women in various states of undress drifted across her mind.

She shouldn’t be thinking of them like this, but she really couldn’t help it. She was finally free from her father’s influence, no longer forced to conform to his idea of how a woman should act. She should be able to indulge in a few fantasies, right? Even if that was true and a few fantasies were harmless, it didn’t stop the sting of guilt whenever she imagined Blake’s bountiful bosom pressed up against her.

“Uh, Weiss?” Yang hissed, prodding her sharply and Weiss opened up her eyes in confusion. “Blake’s done, you can stop recording.” With a jolt, Weiss realised that Blake had indeed stopped playing and was looking expectantly at her. With a small surge of embarrassment, Weiss turned off the recording and plugged in her own headphones borrowed from Yang to give the track a quick listen. It was good. The microphone wasn’t the best quality, but it was serviceable. Knowing Yang, she’d probably say that it made the whole thing sound more ‘authentic’.

They practically flew through the next couple of recordings with Blake. They had to do a couple of takes of one song which had a particularly tricky bassline, but they got enough in the end that Weiss was confident she could comp something together. As the final note faded away and Weiss ended the recording, Blake rejoined them in the partitioned room.

“How’s it sound?” She asked, leaning over Weiss’ shoulder to look at the laptop screen, not seeming to notice how her breasts pressed into Weiss’ back, making her freeze in place.

“Good! Very good. I don’t think I’ve got too much work I need to do on it.” Weiss answered quickly, trying to focus on anything but the twin mounds at her back.

“Great. Ruby, I guess you’re up.” Blake flashed a smile at Ruby, who hopped to her feet and skipped out into the performance area, grabbing her guitar and plugging it in. Weiss breathed a quiet sigh of relief as Blake settled into the chair Ruby had just vacated and she refocused on getting the software set up for Ruby. As she did so, a thought occurred to her.

“Yang, I’m not sure how I’m going to mix this without taking your laptop with me.”

“Why not?” Yang asked, forehead creasing in confusion.

“I, uh, don’t have a computer.” Weiss admitted, blushing a little as she confessed this.

“Ah, that might be a problem.” Yang frowned, but was interrupted by Blake.

“You can borrow my laptop, Weiss, just stick the files on a USB or whatever.” She offered with a shrug, already digging in her bag.

“You brought it with you?” Yang asked curiously, joining Blake in looking into her bag.

“Nah, it’s back at my place. Weiss is crashing with me for a while.” Blake said offhandedly before letting out a small cheer of triumph as she pulled a USB stick out of a side pocket.

“She’s what?” Yang’s eyes narrowed at Weiss, who quailed a little under her glare.

“Weiss is staying at my place for the time being.” Blake reiterated with an eye roll. “You didn’t see where she was staying, Yang. It was a crappy little motel, no way she was safe there.”

“I’m sure she would’ve been fi-.” Yang tried to argue but Blake cut her off.

“She has a Moog One, Yang. Do you have any idea how much that shit is worth?” Wincing a little, Yang nodded, clearly she did know what one of those was worth.

“Okay, yeah, but did you really have to invite a practical stranger into your home?” Yang continued to give Weiss a suspicious look as Blake sighed.

“Look, it’s my apartment, I can do what I like with it. Just remember that Weiss is there next time you decide to come over.” Blake gave Yang a very pointed look, which Weiss didn’t understand and was prevented from trying by Ruby calling out from the other half of the room.

“Are we gonna start or what?” She complained loudly, tapping her foot expectantly. Weiss quickly gestured for the other two to be silent as she started up the recording and the drum track for Ruby. Weiss had seen it a little yesterday, but with a larger room to move around in, Weiss found out just how much Ruby would jump around. She would definitely have to comb through the track to take out the sounds of her feet thumping.

What was perhaps more impressive was how, despite all her flailing and activity, Ruby didn’t miss a single note. Weiss had been given the scrawled out sheets to look over before they started recording, and from what she could tell, Ruby was playing it perfectly. The girl must practice a lot. Weiss imagined Ruby’s hatred of discordant sounds meant she worked very hard to play her part perfectly.

Ruby was quite out of breath as she played the last loud power chord and had to rest for a minute to catch her breath. Whilst she did so, Weiss listened through the recording. She was actually quite jealous of just how precise Ruby’s playing was, she was way too good for small-time.

With Ruby recovered, they recorded the next few songs in relatively quick succession, though Ruby did need a little time between each one to rest. Eventually, they got all of Ruby’s guitar tracks recorded. Now all they needed were her vocals, but when Weiss told Ruby to warm up for it, she hesitated.

“Something wrong?” Weiss asked, as Ruby shuffled uncomfortably on the spot.

“I don’t think I should do the vocals, I can’t hit the high notes properly.” She said with a small frown.

“Well, you’re the only one who can, Ruby. Blake and I have even deeper voices than you.” Yang pointed out, folding her arms.

“Well…” Ruby cast a glance over at Weiss and they all realised what Ruby was implying.

“No, no way.” Yang said firmly, her scowl from yesterday firmly in place. “She is not singing on our EP.”

“Yang, you’ve heard her sing, she’d be perfect!”

“She’s not a part of the band!” Yang continued to argue, turning her irritated gaze on Weiss.

“People use session musicians all the time.” Ruby fired back with a pout. Weiss looked between the two sisters nervously, trying to think of a way out of this.

“I’m not sure I really should.” She interrupted before Yang could argue any further. “You want people to listen to you. When you perform, you’ll be the one singing, Ruby. If I were to sing, you’d be setting up a different expectation.”

“But you’re just better at singing than I am.” Ruby shrugged. “I want us to make the best EP we can, and we should use all the resources available to us, and that includes you.”

“I don’t even know the words to the songs or how they’re supposed to sound.” Weiss pointed out, hoping that Yang or Blake might back her up on this.

“I gave you the lyrics.” Pointing at the sheets, Ruby set her jaw stubbornly.

“A couple of hours ago, Ruby, I’m good, but I’m not  _ that  _ good.” Shaking her head, Weiss flashed Blake a pleading look.

“Ruby, if Weiss doesn’t want to do it, then we shouldn’t force her.” Blake told the younger woman, finally stepping in on the debate.

“It’s kind of you to offer, but I don’t think I’m suited to it.” Weiss offered Ruby a small smile as she huffed and looked like she wanted to keep arguing, but relented with a sigh.

“Fine. I guess we can have a discordant mess of a debut EP.” She grumbled, walking over to set the mic stand so she could sing into it. Breathing a small sigh of relief, Weiss shot Blake a grateful look before starting to record. Yang looked rather satisfied she’d managed to get her way, even if it wasn’t for her own reasons, though she did keep eyeing Weiss darkly. So much for Yang’s better attitude.

Ruby really was too hard on herself. She was a good singer, even if she couldn’t quite hit the high notes on that one song. Weiss ran Ruby through her paces, trying to get her to hit the notes, even if it was just slightly beyond her range. She could fix it later though. She added it to her list of edits she’d have to do.

Eventually, they got the lead vocals recorded and Blake took Ruby’s place to do the backing. Ruby sat grumpily in her chair, refusing to look at Weiss as she recorded the last few tracks they needed.

“I think that’s everything, since you want it to be more, how did you put it… ‘stripped down’?” Weiss smirked at Yang, who rolled her eyes, but at least seemed to be in a bit better mood now.

“Yeah. If you can do as little editing as possible, that’d be good.”

“I’ll see what I can do, but I make no promises.” Weiss answered neutrally as she took the USB stick from Blake and started transferring the files over.

“Well, I guess that’s good enough. How long do you think it’ll take for you to put a demo version together?” Yang asked as she left the partition to start packing up her drum kit.

“I can work on it pretty solidly for the next few days, so hopefully by the weekend, if you and Ruby are free to have a listen then?” Weiss said as she finished the transfer and unplugged the stick, handing it to Blake for safe keeping.

“I think so? Ruby, what are our schedules like?” Yang turned to her sister, who had joined her in the main room to help put their things away.

“Let me see…” Ruby pulled her phone out and flipped through it. “You’ve got morning shifts on Saturday and Sunday, I’m running deliveries all day on Saturday. So it’ll have to be either Saturday evening or Sunday afternoon.”

“It would probably have to be Saturday evening, since Sunday afternoon isn't ideal. I wouldn’t have much time before I start work on Monday to make any last changes.” Weiss told them as she and Blake cleared up the chairs in the partition.

“Oh, you got a job? That’s good. What are you doing?” Yang paused in her dismantling of her drum kit to look at Weiss curiously.

“I’m, uh, working here as a new store assistant.” Weiss cowered a little, fully expecting Yang to explode at her but surprisingly the blonde just shrugged.

“Oh, I shouldn’t actually be that surprised. Mom’s always been kind of a bleeding heart.” Returning to picking up her snare, Yang did pause for a moment as a thought occurred to her. “Don’t let Mama get you down. She likes to act tough, but that just means she likes you.”

“Is that where you get it from?” Weiss snarked as she finished with the chairs and entered the main room to grab one of the amps.

“Oh, ha ha, very funny.” Yang grumbled, rolling her eyes and carrying the drums out of the room as Weiss followed.

“Hey, you can’t deny you’ve been kinda bitchy to me.” Weiss pointed out as they walked to the practice room they’d first met in yesterday.

“I prefer the word ‘standoffish’.” Yang sniffed, pushing open the door and setting her drums down inside.

“Look, Yang, I’d kinda like us to get along, since I’m working in your moms’ shop and living with Blake.” Weiss sighed, setting the amp down just inside the door before standing in the doorway to present Yang from leaving. “We’re probably going to be seeing quite a lot of each other.”

“Okay, fine, I’ll tone it down a little.” Yang grumbled, rolling her eyes. “And I guess we can sort of start over.”

“Great, cool.” Weiss stepped back and allowed Yang to leave the room. They ran into Blake and Ruby coming the other way, carrying the bass drum between them.

“Hey, we were just talking about whether we should hit the café, celebrate the success of the recording sesh.” Blake puffed as she carried the hefty instrument down the corridor.

“I don’t know, I’ve got a closing shift today and I need to get some other stuff done before that.” Yang hissed reluctantly. “Rain check though? It’s been a while since we’ve just hung out.”

“Yeah, sure.” Blake sounded a little disappointed but nodded. “I guess we’re on our own for the rest of the day, then, Weiss.”

“Sure. Do you mind coming with me to get a new sim?” Weiss asked, slipping past Ruby and Blake with Yang.

“Only if you don’t mind coming with me to get a new apartment key cut.” Weiss groaned at Blake’s counter offer.

“Blake, please don’t tell me you intend to pay for that as well.” She asked and Blake shrugged.

“It’s for my benefit as much as yours. This way I don’t have to always be around to let you into the apartment.” Blake pointed out before disappearing into the room and emerging a few moments later. “If it makes you feel bad, you can pay me back later.”

“I’ll hold you to that, Blake, and I’ll start paying you rent soon as well.” Jabbing a finger in Blake’s face for emphasis, Weiss waited until she nodded in reluctant agreement before turning and heading back into the large room to retrieve the other amp.

After a few minutes, they’d returned all their equipment to the Grimm Sisters’ usual room and collected their things before leaving the backrooms to find Raven busy with a customer. “Look, we can set up your guitar, but we’ve got a backlog to work through, so it won’t be ready for the weekend.” She explained to the man, with the air of someone who’d had to explain this several times already.

“I need it for Friday night though!” He shouted angrily, and Weiss felt Ruby free up next to her. “Don’t you know who I am?”

“Nope, and I doubt we should care either.” Yang declared loudly, striding over to the man and getting up in his face. “You could be the most famous fucking guitarist in the whole damn country and I wouldn’t give a flying fuck. You. Don’t. Skip. Got it?” The man looked like he was about to argue back, then he noticed just how buff Yang was.

“Ugh, this isn’t worth this shit.” He growled, snatching up his guitar case and stalking out of the store.

“Yang, I told you not to yell at our customers.” Raven chided, but was unable to keep a proud smirk off her face.

“It’s not like you could yell at him, or Mom would get mad at you.” Yang fired back with an identical barely suppressed smirk. “The customer is always right, after all.”

“Yeah, yeah. You girls get everything recorded okay?”

“I think so. I need to go through them all with a fine tooth comb, but I’m pretty confident.” Weiss said with a small smile. “Hopefully I can get it all mixed before I start work on Monday.”

“Great great. I’ll see you then if I don’t see you before.” Raven said, trying to sound bored and uninterested, although a small smile tugged at the corner of her mouth.

“Right, see you then, Raven.” Weiss called over her shoulder as she and the others headed to the door.

“That’s Mrs Branwen to you. Don’t forget I’m your boss.” Raven called after her as the door swung shut behind her.

“Well, I guess I’ll see you two on Saturday, then.” Weiss told Yang and Ruby, who nodded.

“Sure. See ya, Weiss.” Ruby chirped, pulling her into a quick hug before moving onto Blake. “Can I come over tomorrow, Kitten?”

Blake shot a quick glance at Weiss before replying. “I don’t think so. Sorry, Cookie.” Ruby pouted a little at this, but wrapped Blake in a hug nonetheless, before waving goodbye to the pair and walking off with her sister.

* * *

That evening, Weiss sat on the sofa fiddling with her phone. She’d installed her new sim and was busy catching up on everything she’d missed in the news. There’d been no official press release on her departure from Schnee Records. Knowing her father, he’d probably keep it as quiet as he could whilst he tried to come up with a good spin for it.

Or at least she had been, until she realised her data was running out. She’d been forced to get a sim on the cheapest contract she could and it had come with a truly pitiful data plan.

Blake had mentioned something about the wi-fi yesterday, but she hadn’t had a way to connect to it properly then. Groaning, Weiss got to her feet and walked over to Blake’s room and knocked on the door quietly. Blake had retreated into her room after they’d eaten dinner, bidding Weiss a good night as she did so.

“Blake? Can I get the wifi password, please?” She called through the door, only to hear no reply. She knocked a little louder, but still received no response. After a moment, she remembered that Blake had put up that soundproofing. Weiss tested the door handle and was surprised to find it unlocked.

Considering it for a moment, Weiss shook her head and pushed open the door. “Blake, sorry for just barging in on you, but you weren’t answ-.” Weiss’ voice drifted off as she took in the scene before her.

Blake wasn’t completely naked this time. She still had a bra on, but she was paused mid-thrust squatted over a large purple dildo stuck to the floor. Just in front of Blake was her desk with a monitor angled down so she could see it, as could Weiss. On the screen was a video feed of Blake paused in the middle of fucking herself, with the door open in the background and Weiss standing there staring.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dildo Count: 2
> 
> I knew that counter would come in handy. Anyway, poor Weiss getting caught up in band friction whilst being annoyingly attracted to them. Blake also really needs to learn to lock doors or something. 
> 
> I've set up a [discord](https://discord.gg/4t3y25e) so feel free to join and stuff, I'm pretty active there these days.
> 
> Big thanks to [machiavellianFictionist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/machiavellianFictionist) for proofreading and being annoyingly hot. Lots of thanks too to my lovely girlfriend [Ruby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RubyAndNanaAO3) for beta reading and putting up with this story's unreasonable horniness.
> 
> Thank you too to my official supporters, send a PM or hop on the discord server for details.


	7. Chapter 7

“Shit! I am so, so sorry!” Weiss yelped, ducking out of the room and slamming the door behind her. Breathing hard, Weiss fled down the hall and into her room, slamming that door as well as she leaned up against it and slid down to the floor.

She wasn’t quite sure what she’d walked in on, but she was very certain it was something she really shouldn’t have. It did also beg the question of why Blake didn’t lock her door if she was going to do something like  _ that _ .

Groaning loudly, Weiss let her head smack against the door with a loud and painful thud. This was awful. If seeing Blake naked hadn’t been enough, now she’d seen her fucking herself on camera. This was the worst. She was going to have to leave, and when Raven and Summer found out, they’d fire her, and she’d be homeless and unemployed again. And to cap it all off all she could think of was how hot Blake looked impaled on her dildo.

No, don’t think about that! Bad Weiss! She mentally berated herself and desperately tried to cleanse her mind of the memory. Of course, much like pink elephants, the more she tried to not think about Blake naked and taking a sizable purple dildo in her pussy, the more she ended up thinking about it and even worse, the more her body reacted to it.

“Stop it!” She nearly shrieked at her dick as it started to tent her skirt a little and strained against her panties. This was hardly the time, and she’d already jerked off today, she shouldn’t be horny again for a while yet.

Weiss’ self-recriminations were cut short though by a hesitant knock at the door. “Weiss? Are you in there?”

Weiss considered not answering and pretending that she’d run out of the apartment, but Blake trying to open the door and finding it jammed against Weiss’ weight put a stop to that plan. “Yes.” She answered mournfully.

“Can we talk, please?”

“I’d really rather not.” Weiss mumbled, tucking her legs up to her chest and trying to ignore how it pressed her half-hard penis against her. “I can have my stuff packed up in ten minutes and I’ll get out of your hair for good.”

“What?! No, Weiss, you don’t have to leave!” Blake protested, pushing at the door again. “Weiss, please, just talk to me, preferably not through a door. I promise I’m wearing clothes.” Weiss couldn’t help but let out a small snort of laughter and clapped her hand over her mouth.

“I think it would be best if we didn’t see each other.” Weiss called through the door, painfully aware of her dick and how it was refusing to calm down.

“Weiss, please, don’t be childish. We’re both adults, we can have a mature conversation about this.” Blake groaned and Weiss heard something thump against the other side of the door that sounded suspiciously like Blake’s head. “Look, Weiss, I’m going to the living room and I’ll wait for you there.”

Weiss didn’t move as she heard Blake leave the other side of the door. She didn’t know what she should do. The sensible adult thing to do would be to talk with Blake, but that small ashamed part of her continued to insist that she should pack up and leave without a word.

She wished she could travel back in time just a few minutes and stop herself from opening that door. Goddess, this was the most embarrassing thing ever. Weiss spent a good several minutes running over the same few arguments in her head over whether she should just woman up and talk to Blake or slink out of the apartment in shame.

Eventually, she got up and smoothed out her skirt as best she could to hide her irritatingly persistent erection before opening the door and shuffling down the corridor and into the living room.

Blake was sitting patiently in the armchair, wearing a comfy pair of joggers and a loose t-shirt Weiss was fairly certain she’d thrown on in a hurry, since it was inside out, and she held a mug in both hands.

“Hey, Blake.” She mumbled, walking around the sofa and sitting down on it, staring resolutely at her nails.

“Hey, Weiss. You want a drink?” Blake asked and Weiss shook her head.

“I’m good.” An awkward silence fell between the two. Weiss picked at her cuticles, waiting for Blake to say something whilst Blake sipped at her drink until she finally broke the tension.

“So, that’s the second time you’ve seen me with my tits out.” She said conversationally, and Weiss was very glad that she hadn’t accepted the offer of a drink as she was sure she would have spat it all over the living room.

“I think that was a lot more than just you with your tits out!” Weiss spluttered indignantly. “And they weren’t out, you were wearing a bra.”

“I mean, yeah, I guess.” Blake shrugged and took another drink as Weiss wondered how she could be so nonchalant about this. “So I’m guessing you kinda figured out why I’ve been a little cagey about my job.”

“Not really?” Weiss cocked her head, piecing things together then she blanched. “ _ That’s _ your job?! You’re a porn star or something?”

Blake winced a little at Weiss’ volume and gestured for her to quiet down. “No, I’m not a porn actress, I make videos for the internet.” Blake paused for a moment then shook her head. “Actually, that makes me sound like a fucking YouTuber.”

“Then what exactly do you do?”

“I’m a camgirl, Weiss, I do live shows and stuff on the internet and people pay money for pictures and videos of me.” Blake shrugged.

“Oh.” That explained a lot, and the other pieces were falling into place for Weiss. Then she realised what Blake had just said and turned beet red.

“You said you do live shows?” She squeaked out and Blake nodded slowly, her face starting to go red as well.

“Did I…?”

“Walk in on one? Yes, yes you did.” With a loud groan, Weiss buried her face in her hands.

“Oh Goddess.” She whined, her voice muffled. “Kill me now.”

“It was only for a few seconds.” Blake reassured her, though Weiss could hear the laughter in her voice. “I closed the stream pretty quickly, though there were quite a few creeps who wanted to see you join me.”

“Why would you tell me that?” Weiss groaned even louder and Blake snickered.

“It’s just a few creeps, nothing to worry about.” Blake waved off Weiss’ concerns but a new one reared its head in their place.

“Oh Goddess, what if someone recognised me?!” Weiss was really starting to panic now. News would get out about her knowing some random camgirl and then they’d wonder why she was there and then father would learn and he’d be so furious he’d hunt her down and drag her back and-.

“Weiss, calm down, it’s okay, nobody recognised you.” There was a shuffling noise, then Weiss felt the sofa sag beside her and a gentle arm wrapped around her. “Like I said, you were only on screen for a few seconds, then you left and I ended the stream.” Weiss was starting to calm down a little, though a different kind of anxiety was building as she realised that, in her attempts to comfort Weiss, Blake’s boobs were now pressed up against her.

SIlently cursing her luck, Weiss tried and failed to will herself not to react, but it was a fool’s errand. “I’m sorry for interrupting your show.” Weiss said, trying to keep Blake’s attention away from her lower body. “I hope I didn’t affect your income too much.”

“It’ll be fine, I’ll just do a show tomorrow and hopefully people won’t pester me too much about you or getting you involved.” Blake said, squeezing Weiss gently and sending more blood to Weiss’ lower parts.

“I do have one question, why didn’t you lock your door?” Weiss asked, keeping her gaze firmly on the wall and discreetly folding her hands in her lap to hide her growing erection.

“I never put a lock on my bedroom door.” Weiss felt Blake shrug against her and she suppressed a small whine at the feeling. “Never needed one, since I was living alone. Guess I should probably get one now.”

“No, you don’t need to do that.” Weiss said hastily, earning a curious smirk from Blake.

“Oh? Planning on a repeat of earlier are we?”

“What?! No!” Weiss denied hurriedly despite the annoyingly pleasant image of herself walking in on Blake again and the resulting tryst. “I meant you could just get a sign or something to hang up whenever you don’t want to be bothered.”

“I guess that would be cheaper and less effort.” Weiss could’ve sworn she heard some disappointment in Blake’s voice, but that was probably her lust-addled imagination running wild still. “I think I’ve got some card and markers around, I can make one for you too. You’ll probably be wanting some privacy yourself, pretty soon too.”

Blake smirked and when Weiss gave her a confused look, she flicked her eyes down at Weiss’ lap where her painfully obvious arousal was showing.

“Shit! Sorry!” Weiss flailed for a moment before grabbing a cushion and holding it over herself. “Goddess, you must think I’m such a terrible pervert.”

“You do remember you’re talking to the woman whose job is to show off her naked body on camera, right?” Blake snorted in amusement but it did little to alleviate Weiss’ embarrassment.

“This is different though!” Weiss didn’t exactly know how to articulate how it was different, but she just knew it was somehow. “I’ve seen you naked, twice! And it was without your consent!”

“Weiss, please listen to me, I told you it’s fine.” Blake sighed, rolling her eyes. “I don’t really mind you seeing me naked or getting turned on by it.”

“But-but.” Weiss flailed, trying to verbalise her issue as Blake continued with a smirk.

“And if seeing me naked still makes you feel like there’s an imbalance in our friendship, that offer for you to get naked is still open.” There was an almost eager glint in Blake’s eye that Weiss was definitely sure was her hormone-charged mind talking. So instead she shook her head vigorously, not trusting her voice and Blake just shrugged in response.

“Well, it’s an open offer if you change your mind.”

“How can you be so nonchalant about this?” Weiss finally managed to say after a few moments of trying to get the words right.

“Again, this is kind of my job. You get pretty used to sex and nakedness.” Blake said with a hint of exasperation. “Well, I think that pretty much covers everything… Oh! Here.” She held out a piece of paper, which Weiss took warily. “You wanted the wi-fi password. I’m gonna go first, that’d probably be more comfortable for you.”

With a small grin, Blake got up from the sofa and left the room with a small wave. “See ya later, Weiss.”

“See you.” Weiss responded automatically, not quite sure what to make of what had possibly been the strangest conversation she’d ever had. Sighing deeply, Weiss looked down at the cushion still covering her erection. “Well you were no help.” She hissed at it, before she remembered she was literally talking to her dick and promptly stopped.

Grumbling quietly to herself, Weiss got up and set the cushion aside before hurrying into her room. Closing the door firmly behind her, she walked over to her bed and sat down, pulling out her phone. Connecting to the apartment’s wi-fi, Weiss returned to scouring the news for any mention of her before giving into temptation.

It was just innocent curiosity, she was intrigued by this career path Blake had described, and spent a little bit of time looking things up about it, which was how she ended up on one of the most popular sites. It was not doing anything to lessen her arousal, looking at these pictures of women in various states of undress, advertising themselves and their content.

Weiss did wonder for a moment whether Blake was on the platform, but a search for her name yielded no results, which made sense. She doubted Blake would use her real name for something like this, too risky.

Then her attention settled on the filter settings and a not-so-innocent curiosity took over. With a few reasonable estimates of Blake’s measurements and other physical features, though she found putting in Blake’s ethnicity more than a little awkward, as she had to guess.

Soon she was scrolling through various pictures of women, looking for Blake. She still felt a fairly large pang of guilt for doing this, but she justified it by telling herself that Blake had put herself out there. She couldn’t complain if someone were to look her up.

There! About halfway down the page of twenty-odd results, Weiss could recognise that sultry smirk anywhere. Weiss opened up the page perhaps a little too eagerly and looked through ‘Bella Gambol’s’ offerings. There was a link to a cam site where Weiss presumed Blake did her streams, which hosted several pre-recorded videos and a few enticing photos.

Weiss blinked in surprise as she looked at the most recent publicly posted photos of her wearing nothing but a towel and a flirty smile. Those must have been taken that morning after Blake had taken her shower, and the timestamp of when they were posted suggested as much.

Now Weiss understood why Blake had rushed to get her phone that morning. They were very good pictures too, just racy enough to hint at something more, but only ever hinting. The closest she got was when she’d unwrapped her towel and held it artfully in front of herself, showing just a hint of her areola.

This was getting to be too much, but Weiss couldn’t stop staring at the picture. Blake’s enticing grin, the coy way she held the towel. It was so easy for Weiss to imagine Blake was right there in the room with her, the towel ready to drop to the floor and expose Blake’s full curves to Weiss.

She should stop thinking about this, she really should. This was her housemate, her friend and sort-of landlady, this was highly inappropriate. But, much like this morning, her attempts at being good were for naught and her dick remained firmly erect.

“Fucking shit.” She hissed, giving up again and tossing her phone aside to strip off her dress before falling back onto the bed and groping desperately at herself. This was possibly the most she’d been aroused without direct stimulation, and her panties were straining to hold her cock in until Weiss eased them down her thighs.

Her left hand slid sensuously down her tummy to rest at the base of her cock and she wrapped her delicate fingers around it. Her other hand moved up to caress her bra clad boobs, alternating every few seconds as she teased her nipples to stiff peaks. Hormones had done wonders for their sensitivity, and she let out a few squeaks as she pinched her nipples hard.

Closing her eyes, Weiss imagined Blake, still wearing just her towel, bursting in like Weiss had done with her, catching Weiss in this carnal act. Only Blake wouldn’t flee like Weiss had, she’d instead get that devious smirk of hers and drop her towel to the floor before falling to her knees and staring in awe at Weiss’ rock-hard cock.

“Oh fuck!” Weiss hissed, her imagination running wild at the thought of Blake seeing her naked and pleasuring herself, stroking herself to climax, desperate for pleasure. Weiss both hated and loved this, but the part of her that hated it was far smaller in the moment than the part that loved it so she kept going.

The Blake in her imagination had now tentatively reached out and was now stroking her dick, sliding back the foreskin and letting her calloused fingers ghost over the sensitive head. Weiss bit back a whimper as clear precum started leaking out of the slit, dribbling down the shaft and onto her fingers and those of imagination Blake.

“Blaaaaaake.” Weiss sighed, thrusting her hips up in her desperation for pleasure. She couldn’t remember a time when she’d wanted so strongly, her sexual desires had been an odd mix of very definite yet nebulous. She’d pretty much always known she’d exclusively been into women, but anything more specific than that had been up in the air. At least it had been before Blake.

Weiss bit her lip hard as she gathered the leaking liquid and rubbed it in delicate circles over the head of her penis. There were no words to describe just how much she wished it was Blake doing this to her, Blake’s hands worshipping her flesh, using her own body to bring her pleasure.

Fuck, she wasn’t going to be able to last much longer if she kept thinking like that. In fact she could already feel herself getting close, the image of Blake caught mid-thrust on her dildo was still fresh in Weiss’ mind, and she imagined it was her instead of the dildo, imagination Blake bouncing up and down on Weiss’ cock, her thick thighs slapping against her as she rode Weiss to climax.

“Ahhh!” Weiss gasped out breathily as the thought of Blake fucking her pushed her over the edge and she squirted a few weak jets of watery cum onto her hand. Breathing hard, Weiss absently raised her hand to her mouth and licked it clean, having always enjoyed her own taste.

Now that the moment was over, however, and the rush was fading, it was replaced with a mounting feeling of guilt. She’d done it again. Goddess, she was an awful person. Her flimsy justification for looking up Blake’s profile falling apart beneath her determination to punish herself for her attraction to her new friend.

It was wrong, there was no other way around it. She was violating Blake’s autonomy or something by doing this. She needed to get a grip, and not one like she’d just had on her dick. She and Blake had talked things out and they should no longer have this problem of Weiss seeing Blake in sexual situations.

Sighing, Weiss continued to lay there on her bed, staring up at the ceiling. She could get started on the editing tomorrow. For now, she was content to just wallow in her own awfulness and wait for sleep to take her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dildo Count: 2
> 
> At last, Weiss is clued in to what Blake does for a living. Took her long enough, but she's got there. We've also pretty much determined that Weiss is unable to masturbate without feeling incredibly guilty about it. She should probably sort herself and that out before something bad happens.
> 
> I've set up a [discord](https://discord.gg/4t3y25e) so feel free to join and stuff, I'm pretty active there these days.
> 
> Big thanks to [machiavellianFictionist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/machiavellianFictionist) for proofreading and being awesome. Lots of thanks too to my lovely girlfriend [Ruby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RubyAndNanaAO3) for beta reading and providing more than enough inspiration for this fic.
> 
> Thank you too to my official supporters, send a PM or hop on the discord server for details.


	8. Chapter 8

Weiss spent the next few days working on the slightly battered laptop Blake had loaned her, mixing the Grimm Sisters’ tracks. As it turned out, Blake only used the laptop for going out and writing. She had a much powerful machine to do her streams on.

To save everyone more embarrassment, Blake had made up a sign that she would put up on her door whenever she was doing a show or recording something. Of course, knowing when Blake was live made it very tempting for Weiss to visit Blake’s page again and watch her shows

To save herself from temptation, Weiss spent as much time as was reasonable out in the common areas with a pair of headphones to work on mixing the tracks. Of course, that did mean that Weiss was still exposed to Blake in the times when she wasn’t doing shows.

She had mercifully remembered to wear clothes in the common areas of the apartment, though the clothes she did wear were rather skimpy and tight. It took a lot of self-restraint on Weiss’ part not to ogle Blake and the way her bountiful bosom threatened to burst out of her tank tops, or how her ass stretched out her tiny shorts.

But despite the distractions of her roommate, Weiss was able to finish the mixing by Saturday afternoon as promised. Admittedly, she wasn’t entirely pleased with the result, it still sounded rather rough and unpolished. But given Yang’s feelings about how her band should sound, she’d probably be more than pleased with the result.

Satisfied that she’d done a good enough job, Weiss picked up the laptop and ventured down the hall to Blake’s room. There was no sign indicating Blake was doing a show right now, but Weiss knocked anyway. For all she knew, Blake might like just lounging around in her room naked, and Weiss didn’t need to see that again, not if she valued her current state of mind.

After a couple of moments, the door swung open to reveal an oddly-conservatively dressed Blake, looking a little harried. “Hey, Weiss. I’m kinda busy right now.”

“Oh, sorry, I just wanted to let you know that I’ve finished mixing the tracks.” A small smile broke through Blake’s anxious expression.

“Great! I’d listen to them now, but I’ve gotta get going, so I’ll listen later when Ruby and Yang get here, okay?”

“Sure, that’s fine.” Weiss agreed, stepping back to allow Blake to leave her room. “Would you mind shooting them a message to let them know I finished? I don’t have their numbers.”

“Yeah, sure, I’ll do it on the way.” Blake said, walking into the living room, grabbing a pair of boots and starting to pull them on.

“Where are you going, if you don’t mind me asking?” Weiss followed her and set the laptop down on the coffee table.

“My dad called a little earlier. He and my mom want to have coffee with me today, since it’s been a while since we’ve seen each other in person.” That explained why Blake was wearing a jumper and jeans rather than her normal clothes. Although, even though they covered up a lot of Blake’s skin, the clothes still clung to her body in annoyingly pleasing ways.

“I take it you don’t really want to meet them?”

“It’s complicated, and I’d rather not get into it right now.” Blake finished pulling on her boots and grabbed a handbag, looking for all intents and purposes to be a young office lady out on the weekend for a date or something. “I’ll see you later, Weiss.”

“Sure. Hope it goes okay.” With a brief smile at Weiss, Blake left the apartment, leaving Weiss alone in the living room with very little to do.

Sighing, Weiss picked up the laptop again and wandered into her bedroom with it. With Blake absent she didn’t really have much to do. Then again, she’d never really had much free time before leaving her contract. She’d always been kept busy, practising for her next performance, sticking to her personal trainer’s fitness regime, sometimes working on her tracks for the next album release.

Now that she was free, she honestly didn’t know what to do with herself. She’d never been allowed to develop any hobbies outside of performing music and she really found herself at a loss for what to do. In the absence of anything better to do, Weiss sat down on the bed and looked at the music she’d left open. Her neatly labelled tracks all stitched together to make a rather harmonious mix.

Weiss hated to admit it, but she was rather jealous of Ruby and her skills in composing and writing lyrics. As talented as Weiss was at performing, she was surprisingly incapable of mustering an ounce of creativity to actually compose something. Every time she tried, it ended up being rehashes of other pieces of music she’d learned.

She really needed to find a hobby, one that wasn’t related to music. Exiting out of the program Weiss opened up the browser and searched for ‘fun hobbies’. She wasn’t sure what she’d get but at least it would be something.

“Gardening, don’t have a garden. Camping, can’t afford it. Find new music, trying to avoid music.” Weiss muttered to herself as she scrolled through the first result’s suggested list. “Reading, don’t have any books…” Weiss paused and looked around at the room. Blake had said this was her junk room, she probably wouldn’t mind if she borrowed a book or two.

Getting off the bed, Weiss walked over to one of the stacks of books and started looking through it. They hadn’t changed since the last time she’d looked a few days ago. Still various law books, more than Weiss felt like a single person would ever need. Weiss was now wondering why Blake even had all these books. Even if she liked reading, textbooks weren’t exactly the sort of thing people collected. Unless Blake had needed them for something else.

Blake hadn’t really talked much about herself. She wasn’t really all that talkative, and Weiss had spent most of her time wearing a pair of headphones to do the job she’d been hired for. It actually made perfect sense that Blake had maybe gone to law school, though it didn’t really explain why Blake was now working as a camgirl and hanging around with a small-time punk band.

Then again, there were countless possibilities for why Blake wasn’t in law school anymore. Either way, she shouldn’t be coming up with wild theories, so instead Weiss continued sifting through the disorganised pile in search of some reading material that was a little less dry.

There were a couple of books that had been deemed classics by the consensus of people who apparently knew what books were classic, but none of them caught Weiss’ interest. She didn’t particularly want to read about whale hunting or Victorian poorhouses.

Unable to find anything interesting in that pile, Weiss moved on to another one, only to find even more textbooks. With a sigh of dejection, Weiss flopped onto the floor dramatically. Even if there was no one to see her dramatics, it was important to convey to the universe her displeasure.

Rolling over, Weiss ended up looking under the bed and to her surprise she saw a box labelled ‘books’. Curiosity piqued, Weiss reached out and pulled the box out and opened it. The label was accurate, it did indeed contain books. Weiss pulled the top one out to read the title.

“Ninjas of Love: Volume One?” She mumbled to herself, examining the front cover. It seemed fairly nondescript, but with a title like that, Weiss was under no illusion that this was some kind of romance novel.

Well, she had been looking for something to read and it was either this or some dull textbook. Getting up off the floor, Weiss lay down on the bed and began reading the book.

She didn’t make it past the second page before she was forced to slam the book shut, blushing furiously at the lurid descriptions within. ‘Ninjas of Love’ was a highly inaccurate title, ‘Ninjas of Great Perversion’ would have been far more accurate.

Tossing the book aside, Weiss scrambled down to look inside the box again, pulling out the other books. They were all part of the same series, all the way up to volume 6 and a quick scan of the others revealed them to be just as smutty as the first.

Weiss wasn’t sure why she was so surprised that Blake owned erotica, thanks to her brother’s assistance in bypassing their father’s firewalls, Weiss had built up something of a collection herself. Perhaps it was the format that was so surprising, Weiss didn’t think they even printed paper books anymore. The only paper she’d handled in the last few years was sheet music. The few books she had read had all been ebooks.

It definitely helped Weiss build up more of a picture of what Blake was like, and Weiss continued to rummage in the box, the initial shock of the discovery having passed by now. Pushing aside some other books, Weiss felt around blindly in the box as she read the blurb of one of the books she’d pulled out, when her hand brushed up against something rubbery.

Confused by this odd texture, Weiss grabbed the object, and her stomach plummeted as she realised what it was. With almost sick curiosity, Weiss pulled it out of the box to confirm that, yes, Blake, for whatever reason, kept a dildo in the same box as her smut.

It the occurred to Weiss that the sex toy might not be entirely sanitary, and she dropped it with a yelp. Just how many masturbatory aids did one woman need?! Mildly horrified, Weiss hurriedly repacked the box of sex books and shoved it back under her bed, before crawling back up onto the bed and wondering if she should disinfect her hand.

If she’d learned one thing, it was that reading definitely was not the hobby for her.

* * *

Weiss spent the rest of the afternoon browsing YouTube, just something relatively benign to distract her from her somewhat disturbing discovery.

“Come on, you morons, can’t you tell Blue is the imposter?!” She yelled impotently at the screen. It wouldn’t do them any good, but it sure felt good to vent her frustrations at the players. Just as she was about to scream in anguish over another skipped vote, Weiss heard the front door open and shut.

Pausing her video, Weiss got up to poke her head out to check and saw a rather irked-looking Blake kicking off her boots.

“I take it the coffee didn’t go so well.” Weiss ventured tentatively and the other woman laughed mirthlessly.

“What gave it away?” Blake asked sarcastically, flopping moodily onto the sofa and leaning over the back to keep looking at Weiss. “It went about as well as I expected it to.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” Weiss asked, emerging from her room fully and approaching the sofa.

“Not really. My dad sucks, though probably not as much as yours does.” Blake sighed, rolling over so she was now sprawled across the sofa whilst Weiss sat down in the chair. “It’s nothing new, and I don’t know why I keep meeting up with him when I know exactly how the conversation is going to go.” Blake rolled her eyes before lowering her voice to a comically deep baritone.

“So, Blake, have you finally gotten yourself a good respectable job yet?” She said with an accompanying mocking eyeroll. “You know your mother and I are still happy to pay for law school. Maybe whilst you’re there you can start going to the gym again.”

“I’m sorry, Blake.” Weiss wasn’t sure what else she could say as Blake looked over at her.

“It’s alright, I’m used to it by now.” With a heave, Blake sat upright and reached out for her abandoned bag. “Ruby and Yang will be here in about an hour. You want pizza? I don’t feel like cooking tonight.” Weiss nodded her agreement, and Blake set about ordering the food. “Hawaiian good?” Another nod and Blake returned to her phone to finish the order.

“Great, it’s on its way.” Blake dropped her phone aside and looked over at Weiss with a small smile. “So, what have you been up to today?”

* * *

“I’m sure you’d have just as much difficulty if you were playing, Weiss.” Blake argued, gesturing with a slice of pizza.

“I highly doubt it. I have excellent deductive skills.” Weiss said primly, delicately cutting up her own slice of pizza a little awkwardly as she was balancing her plate on her lap.

“If it were just deductive logic, it would be easy. You need to be more than just Sherlock Holmes.” Blake said, voice muffled by a mouthful of pizza. “You need to be able to persuade people and shit.”

“They wouldn’t need persuading if they were competent.” Sniffing, Weiss popped a small piece of pizza into her mouth and chewed methodically as Blake snorted, getting ready to rebut.

“Well-.” She began, but was interrupted by a buzz from their intercom. Quickly dropping her pizza and licking off her fingers, Blake got up to hit the button. “Why did you buzz? Did you forget your keys or something?”

“We thought it would be more appropriate.” Yang’s voice crackled from the speaker, and Blake rolled her eyes and hit the button to let them up. Shaking her head, Blake returned to her pizza, and a few minutes later, the front door opened and the two sisters walked in.

“Blake, please don’t tell me you’re eating that monstrosity again.” Yang groaned the moment she saw Blake’s pizza.

“Fuck you, Yang, I will fight you over this and I will win.” Blake said with a mouth full of pizza as she flipped Yang off.

“Pineapple doesn’t belong on a pizza, Blake. We all know this.” Yang shook her head despairingly.

“I think it’s alright.” Weiss chipped in with a shrug, spearing another piece of pizza and popping it in her mouth, ignoring the look of horror on Yang’s face.

“Okay, Blake, you’re off the hook, but only because Weiss here is committing an even greater sin.”

“I don’t see how I am, I’m just eating my dinner.” Weiss said with confusion.

“You’re eating pizza with a knife and fork, Weiss. You’re supposed to use your hands.” Yang groaned loudly, collapsing onto the sofa and giving Blake an aggrieved look.

“But then I’ll get grease all over my fingers.” Weiss pointed out matter-of-factly and Ruby nodded along vigorously.

“Yeah, Yang, I’ve been telling you this for ages. Grease is bad, it’s all icky and slippery.”

“Betrayed by my own sister!” Yang moaned dramatically, shielding her face with an arm. “Surrounded by heathens who have the worst taste in pizza toppings and use cutlery to eat it. Oh, woe is me!”

“Enough with that, drama queen.” Blake chuckled, elbowing Yang in the side. “You ready to hear what Weiss has put together for us?”

“Yeah, sure. Is it any good?”

“I wouldn’t know, I didn’t get a chance to listen to it.” Blake shrugged as she finished her slice of pizza and licked her fingers clean once more, whilst Weiss pointedly avoided watching the sight. “Dad wanted to have coffee this afternoon.”

“Oh no.” Ruby suddenly sped over to Blake’s side and latched onto her. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, Cookie, nothing pizza didn’t solve.” She reassured Ruby, petting her on the head. “But I don’t really want to think about it, so let’s have a listen to the music.”

Weiss quickly set aside her plate and hurried off to her room to retrieve the laptop, queueing up the songs ready to listen to. Bringing it back, Weiss set it down on the coffee table, and was about to hit play when she remembered something.

“Maybe we should do this in Blake’s room so we don’t disturb the neighbours.” She suggested, and Blake nodded in agreement, gently dislodging Ruby so she could get up. Together they all filed down the hall and into Blake’s room, Weiss feeling a little awkward as she remembered the sight of Blake splayed out on the floor.

With a shake of her head to dislodge the thoughts, Weiss set the laptop down on the bed and hit play.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dildo Count: 3
> 
> Just some domestic stuff and set up of character things for later, not really much else to say about this chapter. Though we do get a clearer picture of the conflict between Blake and her parents. 
> 
> I've set up a [discord](https://discord.gg/4t3y25e) so feel free to join and stuff, I'm pretty active there these days.
> 
> Big thanks to [machiavellianFictionist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/machiavellianFictionist) for proofreading and being hella cute. Lots of thanks too to my lovely girlfriend [Ruby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RubyAndNanaAO3) for beta reading and keeping my mood up whenever it falls.
> 
> Thank you too to my official supporters, send a PM or hop on the discord server for details.


	9. Chapter 9

As the last note faded away, Weiss gave the other three a nervous look. “So… what did you think?” Weiss’ fingers tapped out an anxious rhythm as she awaited their verdict.

“I liked it.” Ruby declared with a wide grin as she rocked back and forth on the bed in excitement. “I could hardly tell I was flat on those high notes.”

“Yeah.” Yang didn’t sound quite as enthused as Ruby did, and a small frown tugged at the edges of her mouth. “Don’t you girls think it sounds a little too… overproduced?”

“What do you mean?”

“It kinda sounds like it was recorded in a professional studio, y’know?” Yang explained, peering closer at the laptop screen.

“Well, technically we did.” Blake pointed out with a small sigh. “Yang, I know you’re all about the authenticity, but do you want our first EP to sound like utter garbage?”

“No...”

“Then maybe accept that sounding at least a little professional is a good thing.” Blake patted Yang comfortingly on the shoulder. “Pretty much anyone can make music these days. Having half-decent production quality will set us apart from the rest.”

“That and the fact we play our own instruments, have far superior composition skills and are a bunch of hot girls.” Ruby added, still grinning. “The last one is pretty much irrelevant to the music, but it helps.”

“Exactly, so stop being so grumpy all the time, Yang.” Blake ruffled the blonde’s hair for a moment until her hand was batted away. “Weiss did a great job for us. There’s just a couple of bits I think could do with a bit of touching up, but on the whole, I think it’s pretty much perfect.”

Weiss breathed a sigh of relief that she had the approval of two and a half members of the band. She’d been rather nervous about this and the consequences of them not liking it. Admittedly, being afraid that she’d be kicked out and lose her job at the store before she’d even started was a bit extreme, but after the difficult circumstances she left her last home in, Weiss had learned not to take such things for granted.

“Well, I’m glad you like it.” Weiss returned Ruby and Blake’s smiles. “I take it you’ll be handling the uploading and everything else?”

“Yeah, don’t worry about that, we’ve got that covered.” Blake reassured her, getting up and stretching out. “And I think in the light of this success, and the fact I still need to get my mind off my parents, that we should go out and celebrate.”

“Are you sure that’s such a good idea?” Yang raised an eyebrow at Blake, who shrugged.

“We haven’t hit the bar in a while and I miss Ren and Nora. Come on, Yang, just a few drinks.” Blake pleaded, her eyes wide.

“I’ve got a shift in the morning.” Yang continued to protest, but it was getting weaker.

“We won’t stay out too long, I promise.” Giving Yang an imploring look, Blake reached out to take her hand. “We wanted to hang out a bit tonight, and Weiss hasn’t seen the bar yet.”

Yang looked over to Ruby with a frown. “What do you think, Rubes?”

“I’m fine with it.” Ruby shrugged, crawling to the edge of the bed and climbing off. “We can stay for a few drinks, but Blake, you’re not getting blackout drunk like the last time.” She pointed a warning finger at Blake, who nodded solemnly.

“I promise I won’t go wild. Even if I would like to be massively drunk so I don’t have to think about how much of a dick my dad can be.” Ruby clicked her tongue disapprovingly.

“It’s talk like that that gets us to tell Ren he’s not allowed to serve you anything alcoholic.”

“Okay, okay.” Blake grumbled, shaking her head. “No excessive drinking, got it.” Rolling her eyes she wandered over to her wardrobe and opened it up. “Let me just get changed into something less stuffy and we can head out.”

Taking the hint, Weiss left the room quickly, not needing another free show from Blake. Ruby and Yang followed her out as well and proceeded to flop down on the sofa whilst Weiss hunted out a pair of shoes.

“Is there a dress code at this bar?” She asked the sisters, who snorted in response.

“Not really, just don’t show up with your tits hanging out or anything and you’re cool.” Weiss blushed a little at Yang’s crude words and she found herself a nice pair of heels to go with her outfit. She really needed to get herself some more casual clothes when she got her first paycheck, after paying Blake what she owed for rent and the like first.

Weiss debated for a moment whether she should throw on some makeup, but before she could come to a decision, Blake emerged from her room in a pair of sinfully tight ripped jeans and a tank top.

“You gonna be warm enough in that, Kitten?” Ruby asked with concern, looking Blake over, her eyes lingering on Blake’s cleavage for longer than Weiss thought was necessary.

“I’m going to wear a coat, silly.” Blake bapped Ruby lightly on the head as she walked past and over to the coat rack, where she retrieved one of her many long black coats. “Now let’s go.”

Together the four left the apartment and made their way down the stairs and out into the cold evening. Blake led the way with Yang walking alongside her, leaving Weiss and Ruby to walk side by side.

“So, what’s this bar like and who are Ren and Nora?” Weiss asked as they strode along the street towards the main part of the city.

“Oh, it’s a pretty cool place. Kinda grimy, but good. They host live music and we’ve played there a couple of times.” Ruby explained cheerily, skipping along. “And Ren and Nora are Yang and Blake’s friends from high school. They’re a couple and they work at the bar.”

“I see.” Weiss was a little apprehensive about meeting even more new people and essentially being added to this pre-existing friend group. She hadn’t exactly had much opportunity to make friends as a child, or even in her teenage years, always too busy practising for the next concert or learning the latest new instrument her father wanted her to pick up, or going to various interviews and having her entire life examined by the media.

It said something that the closest thing she’d had to a friend who wasn’t someone she was related to was Neopolitan, and they’d pretty much hated one another.

That being said, perhaps it would make things easier to just slot into an existing friendship group than having to build up her own when she had no idea how you were supposed to do something like that other than online.

When they got to the city centre, it was already packed with the Saturday evening crowds though they all seemed to be flocking to the more central locations whilst the four of them headed towards where the music store was.

“It’s not that far from the store. All the best places in town are in that area.” Ruby informed Weiss as they dodged around another group of twenty-somethings. “Best dim sum restaurant, according to Uncle Tai, and the coolest adult store in the city.”

“Um, okay.” Weiss blinked in confusion at how readily Ruby offered up that as one of her recommendations. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

“If you pop in, ask for Jaune and tell him Ruby sent you.” Weiss nodded only a little reluctantly. She had absolutely no plans to visit an adult store at all and she most likely wasn’t going to even on Ruby’s recommendation. She had enough problems with Blake being all… Blake around the apartment. She did not need to go out of her way to further fuel her lust.

“Here we are!” Yang announced, coming to a halt in front of a slightly dingy-looking door that had a large man standing outside. “Welcome to Junior’s!”

“Really?”

“Hey, it might not look like much, but Junior’s got some big plans, and sometimes you gotta start from the bottom.” Yang chided Weiss, fishing out her ID and showing it to the doorman whilst the others did the same and the doorman stepped aside to let them in.

The bar was already starting to get crowded. It was loud and not particularly clean, but Ruby, Blake and Yang all fit in naturally, whilst Weiss felt a little out of place in her heels and dress. Weiss glanced over at Ruby, a small amount of concern welling up in her.

“Are you going to be okay?” She asked quietly as they walked towards the bar.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Ruby asked in confusion, cocking her head.

“With all the noises and the general sort of…” Weiss gestured around the bar. “Are you going to be okay with your… y’know?”

“You mean my autism?” Weiss nodded. “I’ll be fine, I’ve been here loads by now and I’m used to it.” Ruby reassured Weiss, and she breathed a small sigh of relief. “And you can just say it, you know? Or you could call it my ‘fucked up head stuff’. That works too.”

“Your head isn’t fucked up, Rubes.” Yang called back to her sister. It seemed she had a sixth sense for whenever her sister was being self-deprecating. The four of them approached the bar and the young man with long dyed hair standing behind it.

“Hey, Ren, the usual please.” She told the bartender who nodded and set about gathering glasses and pouring drinks whilst Blake turned to Weiss. “Weiss, this is Ren, the best bartender in the city.”

“I wouldn’t go as far as to say that.” Ren said. His voice was oddly quiet and measured for someone who worked in a bar, but it carried well. Pouring out some whiskey with one hand, he offered the other to Weiss. “Nice to meet you, Weiss.”

“Likewise.” She shook his hand briefly and let him get back to making the others’ drinks.

“What are you having, Weiss?” Blake asked, taking the glass of whiskey that was slid over to her and passing Ren a bill in return.

“I don’t drink.”

“Ah, come on, live a little and have a drink.” Blake implored Weiss, waving her drink in the white-haired girls direction. “They’ve got all sorts here, and Ren can mix up pretty much any cocktail.”

“I’m not sure…” Weiss’ resolve was wavering a little. She’d never actually tried alcohol before, her mother’s dependency on the stuff had been more than enough to dissuade her from even trying one sip. Maybe one drink wouldn’t hurt though, just the one.

“I bet you’d like a Sex on the Beach.” Yang suggested with a waggle of her eyebrows as she accepted a bright and fruity looking cocktail from Ren, which clashed violently with her punk aesthetic. “Ren makes a great one.”

“Okay, then. I’ll have one of those, please.” Weiss told Ren, who nodded and set about getting the ingredients together after he passed a bottle over to Ruby. She was just reaching into her purse to pay for the drink when Blake laid a hand on her forearm.

“I’ve got it.” She told Weiss, who frowned and didn’t remove her hand from her bag.

“I can pay for my own drinks.” She tried to insist, but Blake shook her head.

“Consider it a thank you for mixing our EP for us.”

“You’re paying me to do that though.” Weiss pointed out, and Blake snorted.

“Just accept the drink, Weiss.” She told her as Ren passed a tall glass filled with a bright orange drink over to her. Gingerly, Weiss took the glass and after scrutinising it for a moment, she took a sip. It was actually pretty good, it tasted sweet and fruity, and though Weiss had no idea what alcohol tasted like, she was fairly certain she couldn’t taste any in her drink.

“There we go. We’ll make a party girl out of you yet, Weiss.” Yang laughed, taking a sip of her own drink. “Let’s go grab a table.” Leading the way and holding her glass up high so it wouldn’t get jostled, Yang found them a small booth. She slid inside with Ruby sitting next to her whilst Weiss and Blake sat down on the other side.

“To our first EP!” Blake raised her glass and clinked it against Yang and Ruby’s before taking a large gulp of her whiskey.

“It’s not done just yet, Blake.” Yang warned, though she still looked rather pleased. “There’s still those last few changes that need doing, and then we’ve got to upload it and start promoting it on social media.”

“I’ve already started that.” Ruby said, pulling out her phone. “I’ve been promoting it on our Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, et cetera, et cetera.”

“Does anyone still use tumblr?” Yang asked, and Ruby shrugged.

“There’s memes and fandom discourse on there, so clearly someone’s there, and maybe they’re into a bunch of gay girls making music.” She said, scrolling through something on her phone. “Anyway, when we drop the EP, I’ll do a big push.”

“You know what would probably help?” Blake suggested, already finishing her whiskey. “If we made some kind of music video, y’know?”

“What? So someone can take it and upload it onto youtube?” Yang scowled as she took a large drink.

“No, we upload it there ourselves.” Blake said as though it was obvious. “We get more attention that way, and maybe get at least some ad revenue.”

“I dunno…” Yang sounded more than a little doubtful of this plan, and Blake just sighed.

“Yang, we’re not living in the nineties anymore. Putting aside the fact that we weren’t even around for most of the nineties, social media and an online presence is a must-have for people trying to do stuff like this. It’s not just playing in small venues like this in the hopes that some agent will pick you up or something, we need to be seen.” Blake explained as she got up from her seat. “I am going to get another drink. Any of you want anything?” They all shook their heads and Blake sauntered off back to the bar, and Weiss tried not to stare at her ass.

Grumbling under her breath, Yang took a moody drink from her glass before setting it back down on the table with a sigh. “Why can’t things just be simple? We write our songs and play our music. Why do we have to jump through these other hoops?”

“It’s just the way things are now. Things have changed since Mom and Mama were playing.” Ruby patted her sister on the shoulder and was about to say something else when there was a loud squeal of microphone feedback that made Ruby clutch at her ears in pain.

“Whoops, sorry ‘bout that, guys!” Someone called out, and Weiss looked around to see a peppy orange-haired girl standing on the stage at the far end of the bar. “Well, it’s that time again!” There were a few hoots and cheers from the crowd as Yang groaned and dropped her head onto the table.

“Oh no, I forgot this was tonight.” She mumbled, twisting her head to keep watching the energetic young woman continue to hype up the crowd.

“What’s tonight?” Weiss asked in utter confusion.

“That girl up there.” Ruby pointed to the stage and Weiss nodded. “That’s Nora, and she had the bright idea of trying to drum up more business for the bar by hosting a karaoke night.” Ruby shuddered. “The sad thing is that it actually worked.”

“Surely it can’t be that bad.” Weiss’ face twisted into a small frown. She’d never experienced anything like a karaoke before, she wasn’t sure what was so bad about it. She immediately learned exactly what could be so bad as the first person got up on stage and began belting out Kiss from a Rose in an off tune and drunken yell.

Watching this for about a minute, Weiss concluded that she wasn’t nearly drunk enough for this and she downed the rest of her drink. Across the table, Yang just looked exasperated at the proceedings whilst Ruby winced everytime a note was off, which was often.

Thankfully the next singer was better, at least they could carry a tune, and Ruby was able to relax a little. “Should we go?” Weiss asked her, remembering what Yang had said about Ruby and discordant noises.

“I’ll be fine.” Ruby insisted just as the nexxt singer tried and failed to hit a high note. “Besides, Blake isn’t back yet.”

“She isn’t?” Yang looked up, only just seeming to notice that Blake hadn’t yet returned. “Oh no.”

“What?” Weiss felt a small burst of panic at Yang’s tone. Maybe Blake had gotten roofied and kidnapped or something.

“Blake’s a bit of a lightweight, and she  _ loves _ karaoke.” Yang placed her head in her hands, and sure enough, the next person to hop on stage was Blake, drink clutched in one hand as she took the microphone in the other. She wasn’t actually that bad given her obvious state of inebriation, as she hollered about not giving a damn about her bad reputation.

The way Yang acted though, it might have been the worst thing in the world as she averted her eyes and tried and failed not to look pained by the performance.

Eventually, Blake finished singing and hopped off the stage to tumultuous applause. Brushing her hair out of her face, Blake flopped back into her seat and grinned widely at the others.

“Can you believe it’s karaoke night tonight?” She gushed, taking another swig of her whiskey. “I can hardly remember why I was annoyed today.”

“Blake, what number drink is that?” Ruby asked in concern and Blake studied the glass, face scrunched up in concentration.

“Four, I think.” She finally announced to the table, and Yang let out yet another groan.

“You were gone for maybe five minutes!” She told Blake in annoyance. “I’m telling Ren you’re cut off.” Shimmying out of the booth, Yang marched off to the bar as Blake booed her.

“No fun!” She whined, taking a more measured sip of her drink now that she knew it was her last. Someone else was up on stage now, butchering some top 20 hit, and Ruby looked rather uncomfortably as the woman squeaked her way through some of the more difficult parts.

Weiss wasn’t the only one to notice Ruby’s discomfort, though Blake’s solution wasn’t one Weiss expected. “Weiss, you should get up there and sing.”

“What?”

“Yeah, you’ve got a far better voice than anyone here, you should show off a little.” Blake said, getting up and trying to tug Weiss out of the booth.

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea.” Weiss tried to protest, though the part of her that was lightly buzzing from her drink seemed to think it was a good idea.

“Come on, Weiss. I want to hear you sing. Plus, you’d be doing Cookie here a favour by making sure some tonedeaf person who can’t sing doesn’t get up on there.” Blake fluttered her eyes at Weiss. “Come on, just one song for us?”

“Okay, fine.” Weiss sighed and tried to ignore Blake’s unsporting gloating at her victory. Carefully, Weiss navigated her way to the side of the stage, where Nora was sat with a laptop, clearly the one in charge of queueing up the songs.

“Hey, never seen you here before.” The woman commented, looking Weiss over. “Rather fancy too for a place like this.”

“I’m a friend of Blake’s.” Weiss said by way of explanation. “She insisted I sing.”

“Ohhhhhhh.” Weiss thought she saw a spark of understanding in Nora’s eyes as she looked over Weiss again. “One of Blake’s  _ friends.  _ I gotcha.” She winked at Weiss. “Well, just pick whatever you want, we’ve got pretty much everything.”

Leaning forward, Weiss scanned through the list of songs on offer. They were listed by category, and she was immensely relieved to see they did have an 80s section. She was afraid she just wouldn’t know the lyrics to any of these songs.

Scrolling down, she eventually hit upon one that she could do, and Nora added it to the queue. “Interesting choice.” She smirked up at Weiss who shrugged.

“It resonated with me.” She said by way of explanation before starting a few quick vocal warm ups. This would be the first time she was singing in front of her new friends and she felt oddly nervous about it. Performing in concerts hadn’t stressed her out nearly as much as this performance was.

“You’re up next.” Nora told Weiss as someone else got up on stage and began singing. Weiss tried to take a few deep breaths to calm herself, but her hands were shaking. “First time performing?” Nora asked, but continued before Weiss could answer. “You’ll be fine. It’s just a bit of fun, after all.”

Weiss nodded choppily, but Nora’s advice did little to steady her nerves, and so she waited anxiously for the song to be over and for it to be her turn.

After another couple of minutes, the last notes died away and the woman on stage took a bow as the bar applauded her. Steeling her nerves and setting her shoulders, Weiss took to the stage and picked up the microphone, a comforting weight in her hands.

Looking out across the crowd she could see Blake and Ruby watching eagerly whilst Yang tried her best to look disinterested. As the opening synth riffs started, Weiss was struck by the other realisation that she’d never sung anything like this in public before.

This was a mistake. Weiss was prepared to jump off the stage and flee in shame, when she caught a glimpse of Nora’s encouraging smile. This wasn’t some big performance in front of a packed theatre, it was a karaoke night in a small bar. She could do this. This was nothing, even if three people whose opinions she cared very deeply about were in the audience. They wouldn’t judge her if it was a bit sloppy, this was just for fun, and she was buzzing from her cocktail.

Grinning broadly, Weiss opened her mouth and sang.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dildo Count: 3
> 
> I actually unironically love karaoke, I think it's fun and I love singing, even though I'm not great at it. I was originally going to have more hints to what Weiss is going to sing, but I couldn't cram it in there without it being too awkward, so have fun guessing. 
> 
> I've set up a [discord](https://discord.gg/4t3y25e) so feel free to join and stuff, I'm pretty active there these days.
> 
> Big thanks to [machiavellianFictionist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/machiavellianFictionist) for proofreading and being awesome. Lots of thanks too to my lovely girlfriend [Ruby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RubyAndNanaAO3) for beta reading.
> 
> Thank you too to my official supporters, send a PM or hop on the discord server for details.


	10. Chapter 10

The song hadn’t been much of a stretch of Weiss’ singing abilities. It was in a register lower than she usually sang, but it still earned her some very enthusiastic applause. Blushing a little, Weiss curtsied and stepped off the stage to make room for the next person to sing.

“Resonated with you, huh?” Nora asked as she cued up the next song, grinning a little at Weiss. “Lemme guess, Catholic school girl?”

“Homeschooled, actually.” Weiss corrected, wincing as the singer started a rather tone deaf rendition of a song Weiss didn’t recognise.

“Still tracks.” Nora shrugged, still grinning.

“I’m not quite sure what you’re implying here.” Weiss said with a small frown. She knew exactly what Nora was hinting at, and was beginning to regret exposing some small part of her not-so-happy home life. “I should get back to Blake and the others.”

“Oh, for sure. Maybe you’ll feel like singing a couple of other things before you leave. You’re more than welcome on this stage anytime. Certainly makes for better entertainment than some of these people.” Nora winced as the current singer tried and failed to hit a high C.

“I’ll think about it.” Weiss said before turning and navigating her way back to the table where the others were waiting for her.

“Weiss, that was fucking awesome!” Blake hollered as soon as Weiss was in earshot and she grabbed the singer once she was in arms reach to pull her back into the booth. “See, Yang? I told you she could sing and it’s not just autotune.”

“I wouldn’t exactly call all of that singing.” Yang said, trying and failing to look superior. “It was like she was just talking about half the time.”

“Pfft, you’re just jealous you can’t sing as well.” Blake scoffed, smirking at Yang who fumed.

“I can sing just as well as she can.” She protested hotly, only for Blake to snort in disbelief.

“Oh yeah, prove it!” It was an obvious goading on Blake’s part, she was probably too drunk to be subtle, but it did work. Downing the last of her drink, Yang got up from the booth.

“Just fucking watch me, Belladonna.” She growled before making her way through the crowd towards the stage.

“She won’t sing better than you.” Blake reassured Weiss, throwing an arm around her shoulders and making her blush. “Don’t worry.”

“Much as I’d like to support my sister, I’d have to agree.” Ruby chipped in, still sipping at her drink and looking a little less worse for wear after Weiss’ song. “Yang’s got a good contralto, which you probably can’t do, but that’s about all she’s got on you.”

“Yeah, you’ve got training and stuff.” Blake grinned lazily at Weiss. “Though I gotta say, I was not expecting you to sing that.”

“What were you expecting, for me to belt out some Carmen or something?” Weiss asked wryly. “I told you I like synthpop, so there you go.”

“Mmm, doesn’t really show your range though.” Ruby said, giving Weiss a thoughtful look. “What else do you know?”

“I know a lot more synthpop, some new wave and a few showtunes.” Weiss shrugged, not sure where Ruby was going with this.

“Do you know Defying Gravity?” Ruby asked and Weiss nodded. It had been another song that had resonated with her, though not quite as much as feeling like your mere existence was a sin.

“Yes?”

“Great, you’re doing a duet with me.” Ruby said. Weiss was about to ask why, but she was interrupted by Yang taking to the stage with all the bluster and swagger of an actual star. When the music started, it was low and bassy with a strong drumbeat, and Weiss had no idea what it was. All the other songs she had a passing familiarity with, but Weiss found herself completely stumped when Yang started singing about fleeting summer love in a low and husky voice.

“It’s one of our moms’ songs.” Ruby informed Weiss softly as she watched her sister sing. “Yang all but threatened Nora to have some of them put in the system.” Weiss nodded in slow understanding, realising now what the lyrics were referring to.

“She’s the only person who sings them.” Blake added with a laugh. “But hey, she loves it, so who are we to deny her.”

Weiss was actually quite enjoying listening to Yang sing. She was definitely a cut above most of the amateurs who’d sung tonight, and in fact, the few rough edges where her technique wasn’t quite as polished only added character to the song. She did have to wonder how Yang felt about singing a song that, as far as Weiss could tell, was just a straight up love song between her mothers, but she seemed to be enjoying it, crooning into the microphone and extolling the virtues of sapphic love.

The way she was singing about soft caresses and stolen glances, Weiss really had to wonder if the song meant more to Yang than just being one of her mothers’. Either that, or maybe Yang just gave off those vibes. Weiss would never claim to have a good gaydar. Despite her status as trans icon or whatever, she’d been kept away from ‘people like that’, as her father had put it.

Wait, hadn’t Ruby mentioned something earlier about being gay? The alcohol was still fuzzing up her mind a little and making it hard to remember as Yang finished her song and jumped off the stage to polite applause.

“There!” She announced as she returned to the table, giving Weiss a triumphant look. “Told you I could sing.”

“Not bad at all.” Weiss clapped politely, earning a frown from Yang. “Some vocal lessons and you could be really quite good.”

“Pfft, I don’t need those.” Yang scoffed as she flopped back into her seat. “I do fine without, and I don’t want to sound like some polished princess or something.”

“Suit yourself.” Weiss shrugged as she wondered if she should get a fresh drink. “I liked the song, very...” Weiss cast around for a suitable word to describe it.

“Gay? Yeah, Mama wrote that one when she and Mom were kind of on the outs.” Yang explained, reaching for her glass before she remembered that it was empty. “They wrote so many songs that were angsty as fuck. It was some of their best work.”

“I don’t think so, I think their best stuff was when they were actually together.” Ruby argued with a frown. “The ones where being gay isn’t all doom and gloom.”

“Agree to disagree.” Yang shook her head, getting up again and collected the glasses. “Anyone else want another drink? Not you, Blake.” Blake’s eager grin faded into an affronted frown as both Weiss and Ruby nodded.

“Another of the same, please.” Weiss asked, and Ruby agreed.

“Yeah. If you don’t mind, Yang. Weiss and I are gonna do a duet.” She announced, sliding out of the booth now that Yang wasn’t in the way.

“Really?” Yang raised an eyebrow at her sister as Weiss slid out of her seat as well. “I thought you weren’t so keen on singing other people’s songs?” 

“I’m making an exception for this.” Ruby said, before grabbing Weiss’ hand and pulling her away from the table and through the crowd up to the stage.

“Hey, Ruby, what’re you doing here?” Nora gave the young woman a curious look, before she caught a glimpse of Weiss. “Oh, hello again, Weiss, couldn’t keep away, could ya?”

“This was Ruby’s idea, not mine.” Weiss sighed as Ruby started going through the song selector, quickly finding the musicals section.

“Got it!” She announced a few seconds later, grinning excitedly at Weiss. “You’re Elphaba, I’m Glinda.”

“I used to know a woman named Glynda.” Weiss commented idly as they waited for their turn. “She taught me piano.”

“Oh, that’s pretty neat.”

“She was very strict, and if I got a note wrong, she would rap my hands with a riding crop.” Weiss added matter-of-factly, earning a horrified look from Ruby.

“She what?”

“It was no less harsh than any of my other tutors.” Weiss shrugged, not sure why Ruby was reacting in such a horrified way. “Once my flute tutor had me practising circular breathing so much I ended up passing out.”

“That really is not okay, Weiss.” Ruby said, sounding incredibly sad. “Did you not get, like, any encouragement at all? Was it all just punishment?”

“Pretty much.” Again Weiss shrugged, not understanding what the problem was. “It worked though. I wouldn’t be the musician I am today if not for their instruction.”

“I see…” Ruby didn’t look too reassured by this. She was saved from having to come up with a response as the singer on stage finished off their rendition of My Way and climbed down, leaving the stage to Weiss and Ruby. “Our turn!”

Tugging Weiss along behind her, Ruby led the way onto the stage and grabbed the microphone, whilst Nora held out another one for Weiss. Taking it, she faced off against Ruby, waiting for the song’s sudden and explosive start.

Ruby really did have quite a lovely singing voice, and was surprisingly good at conveying the initial vitriol of the lyrics. Weiss too threw herself into the song as well, still buzzed from the alcohol and the success of her earlier performance.

It was no aria, but Weiss was able to match Ruby’s understated performance with bombastic enthusiasm. It felt liberating to sing about breaking free from obligation and expectations, in a dingy bar, of all places. Ruby was an almost perfect duet partner. It helped that she seemed to have memorised the song completely and didn’t even need to pay attention to the lyrics on the screen, instead using it to build up a stage rapport with Weiss.

The first time Weiss had listened to the original Broadway recording of Wicked, having never seen the musical, she was convinced that Elphaba and Glinda were in love, and told Winter of her suspicions immediately. Winter had disabused her of that notion, but standing up on stage, performing the musical’s signature number with Ruby, there definitely was some kind of tension between the two of them.

By the time Weiss was belting out the last note, Ruby was staring at her with a look that Weiss could only really describe as adoration. Their performance earned a massive round of applause from the watchers, and Weiss found herself pulled into a tight hug by Ruby before they got off the stage to make room for the next singer.

Weaving their way back through the crowds to their table, they found Yang guarding the fresh drinks from Blake, who was looking at them longingly. As they approached, Weiss couldn’t help but get in a gentle jab at Yang.

“Was that more singing than talking, then?” She teased, reaching out to snag her cocktail whilst Ruby grabbed her bottle.

“I suppose…” Yang said reluctantly, evidently impressed by Weiss’ performance, but unwilling to admit it. “I guess you’ve got a proper set of pipes on you.”

“Well, if you’re interested, I also play piano, flute, violin, harp, clarinet… oh and the theremin.” Weiss smirked at Yang, taking a drink as she did so.

“Really, the theremin?” Blake snorted, looking longingly at Weiss’ drink. “Not exactly an instrument that’s common in the orchestra.”

“I was bored one day, so I bought one and taught myself.” Shrugging, Weiss took another drink. “Father wasn’t best pleased, he intended for me to learn the trumpet next.”

“Weren’t the other…” Yang counted on her fingers, “six enough?”

“Evidently not. I imagine he wouldn’t have stopped until I could play every instrument in a philharmonic orchestra.” Weiss sighed, swirling her drink around in its glass morosely. “Then he could just get me to play all the instruments and he wouldn’t need to hire anyone else.”

“Wow, your dad sounds like a real piece of shit.” Blake said, frowning deeply. “And I thought mine was a pain.”

“Nah, your dad’s pretty shit too, Blakey.” Yang reassured Blake, patting her on the shoulder before pointing a finger in her face. “But that is not an excuse for you to keep drinking. Ren knows you’re cut off.”

“Fiiiine, spoilsport.” Blake grumbled, folding her arms. “I’ll just drink when I get home, I’ve still got half a bottle of vodka.”

“Blake, no.” Yang said, her voice firm now. “No more drinking tonight. or I’ll tell Weiss where you keep your booze and have her hide it when you get back.”

“You really are a control freak sometimes.” Blake grumbled as she got up and squeezed past Weiss. “No more drinking, Blake, it’s bad for you. No, we can’t have Weiss in the band, she’ll ruin our image. No, we can’t change our sound, we have to play only punk music.” she mimicked Yang’s low voice mockingly. “You have fun dictating how everything works. I am going to go have fun and sing another song.” Spinning on her heel, Blake staggered a little before tottering off into the crowd.

“Is… Is she okay?” Weiss asked, watching Blake go. Yang looked rather unhappy whilst Ruby rubbed her arm comfortingly.

“Blake’s got daddy issues out the wazoo and she drinks to cope with them.” Ruby said in a flat tone. “It’s not healthy, and we’ve tried to help, but she just sees it as an attack on her.”

Weiss hummed in acknowledgement and watched as Blake took to the stage once more and a low thrumming bassline started. Weiss didn’t recognise the song, but clearly Ruby and Yang did as they both groaned quietly.

“What’s wrong?” Weiss asked, looking away from the stage for a moment.

“This is one of Blake’s favourite songs, and you’ll see why in a second.” Yang said, a dark and sour note to her voice. Confused, Weiss looked back to the stage, and she could have sworn that Blake was looking right at her as she started singing.

It took a couple of seconds for the lyrics to register in Weiss’ brain, but when they did, it caused her to start blushing furiously. She was definitely imagining Blake staring right at her as she sang about pleasuring herself, anything else would be ridiculous.

After less than a minute of this, Weiss couldn’t keep looking at Blake any longer and tore her eyes away. It seemed Ruby and Yang had the same idea as they were both resolutely staring at their drinks.

“When Blake’s done, I think we should call it a night.” Yang said morosely and Ruby nodded.

“I wanted to hear Weiss sing a bit more, but you’ve got work in the morning, so we can’t stay much longer anyway.” She agreed. Weiss was rather flattered by this, and she preened a little as Ruby pulled out her phone. “Weiss, can I get your number? I don’t trust Blake right now to text that she’s got home safe.”

“Sure.” Weiss pulled out her phone, told Ruby her number and received a text from her a few moments later.

“Thanks.” Ruby stuffed her phone back in her pocket and gave Weiss a look. “If Blake says anything mean, or anything, really, just ignore it. She’s not herself when she gets like this.” She glanced over at the stage, where Blake was now moaning almost orgasmically into the microphone to a lot of whooping from the other patrons.

“I don’t know, this is more like Blake unfiltered than just not her.” Yang said, wincing as Blake let out a particularly loud and sensual moan. Thankfully, the song didn’t last for much longer and Blake got the biggest round of applause yet as she took a bow and stepped off the stage.

The crowd parted almost reverently for her as she swanned her way back to the table, grinning smugly. “So, what did you think?” She asked the three, though most of her focus seemed to be on Weiss.

“Very… interesting.” She said as diplomatically as possible. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Ruby and Yang were hurriedly finishing up their drinks.

“I think we’re going to call it a night.” Yang said, dropping her glass down decisively and sliding out of the booth with Ruby hot on her heels. “I’ve got the opening shift tomorrow.”

“Awww, but we were having fun.” Blake pouted, seemingly having forgotten her annoyance with Yang from just a few minutes ago.

“Work’s important.” Yang told her shortly, already starting towards the door with Ruby in tow, who was giving Weiss a meaningful look. 

“I think I’m ready to call it too.” Weiss said hurriedly, getting up as well. “Sorry, Blake, but I’m not much of a late night person.”

“Pfft, we’ll have to get that trained out of you if you’re going to join us.” Blake snorted, not noticing how Yang paused in her quest to leave and flashed a dark look back at her. “Well, I guess we could go back…” Sighing in disappointment, Blake grabbed her jacket and pulled it back on. Together, the four of them made their way to the exit, Ruby waving goodbye to Ren over the heads of the crowd just before they left.

“Well, see ya, I guess.” Ruby said, hovering awkwardly as Yang didn’t stop and instead started to stride off into the night. “Don’t forget to text me, okay?”

“I won’t.” Weiss promised. “Thanks for bringing me out, it was fun.” Beaming, Ruby pulled Weiss into a tight hug before running off after her sister, leaving Weiss alone with Blake.

“I didn’t get a goodnight kiss from my Cookie.” Blake pouted, watching the two sisters leave.

“I’m sorry?” Weiss said, unsure how sympathetic she should be towards Blake after her spat with Yang.

“Whatever, we should get going.” Blake stuffed her hands in her pockets and started on the way back to the apartment, her steps a little uncertain.

“Are you going to be okay?” Weiss asked after a few minutes of silent walking, passing by the various people who’s nights had only just begun.

“I’ll be fine.” Blake shrugged, still keeping up her pace, despite her wobbliness. “Did they make you promise to hide all my booze when we get back?”

“No, they didn’t.” Weiss assured Blake. “But I’m not sure you should drink any more tonight.”

“I’ll be fine.” Blake dismissed with a wave of her hand. “Getting shit-faced is all part of the rock and roll lifestyle or something.” Weiss sincerely doubted that, but she wasn’t about to argue with a tipsy and slightly belligerent Blake.

Once again falling silent, the pair made their way back to the apartment with no mishaps, other than Blake tripping over nothing and nearly face-planting right into the pavement. It took Blake two tries to key in the correct code for the lobby, but she managed it in the end, and together, they made their way up to the apartment.

As soon as they got in, Blake made a beeline for the kitchen, leaving Weiss to shut the door and turn on the lights. With the room illuminated, Weiss could see that Blake was rummaging through one of her cupboards.

“Are you actually getting more alcohol?” Weiss asked, trying her best to keep the disapproval from her tone.

“Of course! The night’s only just begun and I can still hear my dad telling me how good it will be for my future to go to law school.” Blake called from inside the cupboard before emerging with a half-empty bottle of clear liquid. “Here we go!”

Weiss may not be an expert on alcohol, in fact, she’d only had her first drink maybe an hour ago, but she could tell just by looking at the bottle that it was very cheap alcohol just from the label. Before she could say anything to stop her, Blake unscrewed the cap and took a swig of the drink.

“Fuck, that burns!” She gasped when she’d finished. “Vodka’s not usually my poison, but it gets me drunk the quickest and cheapest.”

“I’m not sure that’s the criteria you should be using.” Weiss ventured, carefully pulling out her phone and sending a text to Ruby telling her that they’d gotten home safely, but that Blake was still drinking.

The reply came back pretty promptly, but by then, Blake had already taken another swig of vodka and was now leaning heavily on the kitchen counter.

‘You probably won’t be able to get the drink off her then. Just try to stop her from hurting herself by any other means. Thanks for looking after her.’ Sighing deeply, Weiss tucked her phone away and walked over to Blake.

“Blake, maybe you should sit down for a bit.” She suggested gently, reaching out and guiding Blake over to the sofa which she collapsed onto heavily.

“You want some?” She asked, offering Weiss the bottle. It would probably be the best way for her to get the bottle away from Blake, but Weiss was afraid of the consequences, so she shook her head.

“I might actually turn in soon. I was up early putting those finishing touches on the tracks.” Weiss lied, hoping Blake’s inebriated state would prevent her from seeing through the lie.

“Awww, but I wanted to stay up with you.” Blake pouted, fluttering her eyelashes at Weiss. “You did such a good job on those tracks though, just a shame you only mixed them.”

“I’m not sure what you mean.”

“Ruby was right, you should’ve been the one singing.” Blake said, leaning in towards Weiss, only to lose her balance and flop over ungracefully.

“I don’t think so. Yang would have killed me anyway.” Weiss said, but Blake shook her head, looking up at Weiss with heavy-lidded eyes.

“Ignore Yang. She’s a control freak, and I can tell after hearing you tonight, Ruby definitely wants you to sing with us.” Blake told Weiss before taking another swig of vodka.

“That was just a bit of fun, I wasn’t singing properly.”

“You sang more than well enough. Couldn’t you tell Ruby was trying to audition you?” Weiss shook her head and Blake snorted. “Well, she was, and she’s certainly convinced now that we need you as our vocalist.”

Weiss wasn’t entirely sure of what to say, though she did remember Ruby’s reminder not to pay any mind to what Blake said when she was drunk.

“I’m not sure that’s such a good idea. I’m just getting my feet under me here, joining a band probably wouldn’t help much, and that’s not even taking into account what Yang has to say about it.”

“You’re a fantastic singer, Weiss. It’d be a shame to let it go to waste.” Blake’s eyes were definitely starting to droop now, the vodka seemed to be taking its toll. “Y’know, you’re really hot when you sing, just like an angel…” Weiss was saved from having to answer this embarrassing statement as Blake’s eyes slid fully shut and she started snoring gently.

Taking this as her cue, Weiss slipped over and carefully took the bottle of vodka from Blake, capping it and then carefully making her way towards her room, making sure to turn off the light as she went.

Once the door was closed behind her, she let out a sigh of relief. That had certainly been an interesting evening, one that Weiss wasn’t entirely sure she wanted to repeat. Still, it had been fun to sing again and sing what she wanted to.

Stashing the bottle of vodka away, Weiss got changed and then slid into bed. Hopefully, when Blake sobered up in the morning, she could make some amends with Yang and she’d forget all about this silly idea that Weiss should sing with them. Shaking her head at the ridiculous notion, Weiss laid down and slowly drifted off to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dildo Count: 3
> 
> More karaoke, and it never actually got mentioned in the chapter itself because I forgot but the song Weiss sang was It's a Sin because I'm a weirdo who inherited her parents' taste in music. Also Blake really does seem to have something of a drinking problem and there's actually a few cracks in the band already. Nothing too major, but we'll have to see how this all plays out.
> 
> I've set up a [discord](https://discord.gg/4t3y25e) so feel free to join and stuff, I'm pretty active there these days.
> 
> Big thanks to [machiavellianFictionist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/machiavellianFictionist) for proofreading and being hella. Lots of thanks too to my lovely girlfriend [Ruby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RubyAndNanaAO3) for beta reading and being really cute, like, just the cutest.
> 
> Thank you too to my official supporters, send a PM or hop on the discord server for details.


	11. Chapter 11

When Weiss woke up the next morning, she was aware of two things. First, she had something of a headache, probably from all the drinking, and second, she was unusually warm. Shifting around a little, she found her movements to be oddly restricted.

Twisting around in an attempt to free herself from whatever it was that was holding her down, Weiss heard a loud and annoyed groan from behind her and she froze in place. Craning her neck around, Weiss’ fears were confirmed.

There was someone else in the bed with her. A very soft and very naked someone.

Weiss could feel her heart speed up to an unhealthy allegro as she felt the naked Blake press up against her, humming contentedly in her sleep.

This was bad, this was very bad. Weiss tried again to free herself, but Blake only grumbled in her sleep and pulled Weiss tighter, pressing her bountiful chest up against Weiss’ back. In that moment, Weiss was very thankful that she slept wearing a night dress as it formed a barrier between her and Blake, albeit a thin one.

“Blake? Blaaaake?” Weiss hissed, realising by now that the only way she was going to get free was if Blake released her voluntarily. “Please wake up.”

There was another unhappy grunt from Blake, followed by some actual words. “Mmmph, too early, cookie. Headachey.” The fact that Blake seemed to think that naked spooning with Ruby was a normal thing to do could wait.

“I’m not Ruby!” Weiss hissed a little louder this time, which finally seemed to dislodge Blake from the realm of sleep.

“Huh?” Blake’s cognisance finally returned to her, but unlike Weiss, she was completely at ease with the situation she found herself in. “Oh, mornin’, Weiss.” She yawned widely and winced. “Ow, fuck! Stupid fucking hangover.”

Not bothering to address her lack of dress or the compromising position she’d woken up in, Blake rolled out of bed and wandered out of the room, leaving a stunned Weiss in her wake. Weiss stayed sitting in bed for a good several minutes before her thoughts finally ground back into motion.

What the ever-loving fuck had that been about? Blake did not get to just crawl into bed with her whilst naked and just waltz off without any sort of explanation or apology. Now filled with righteous anger tinged with embarrassment, Weiss got out of her bed and stormed out of the room in search of Blake, who she found nursing a large glass of water and popping some pills.

“Blake!”

“Please don’t shout.” Blake pleaded, clutching at her head at Weiss’ loud voice. “I’ve got a monster of a headache after last night.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t have drank quite so much.” Weiss snipped, her sympathy muted by her agitation over her unwanted bedmate. A girl had her limits, even if the intrusion in her bed wasn’t entirely unappreciated. “And what was that just now?”

“What was what?”

“You. Naked. In bed with me.” Weiss said, folding her arms as Blake only just seemed to notice her lack of dress.

“... Oh, shit.” She muttered rather succinctly, abandoning her drink to grab a nearby apron which she hastily pulled on. It wasn’t much of an improvement, but at least Weiss wasn’t being treated to another free show. “Sorry, sorry.”

“Would you care to explain what exactly happened that made you think crawling into my bed was such a good idea? Because when I saw you last, you were asleep on the sofa.” Weiss asked, her tone softening just a little.

“Ugh, I don’t know.” Blake groaned before chugging most of her class of water. “I was really drunk last night.” She shook her head before clutching it in pain. “Ow. I think I must have woken up in the middle of the night and just chose a bed at random to crawl into. I’m sorry.”

“And the nakedness?”

“I sleep naked.” That was an image Weiss could have done without, but she nodded slowly in understanding as her anger started to abate with Blake’s explanation. What did not lessen, however, was the embarrassment she felt at having ended up in that situation in the first place.

In fact, now that she was less angry, the embarrassment started to take over as her primary emotion, made no better by the fact that Blake’s attempt at covering herself up looked remarkably like something out of a few of the hentai doujins Whitley had suggested to her.

“I should probably go and get dressed. Start working on those few changes to the EP.” Weiss stammered out before beating a hasty retreat back to her room. She tried not to slam the door behind her before she leaned up against it and slid down to the floor, completely mortified.

Weiss wasn’t sure if this was worse or better than accidentally walking in on Blake’s camshow. Probably better, as she wasn’t contemplating fleeing the apartment this time, but it was still pretty bad. It didn’t matter that it was entirely Blake’s fault, even though she was drunk, Weiss couldn’t help but feel horrifically embarrassed by the incident.

Why did this sort of thing keep happening to her? It beggared belief with how frequently these situations kept on occurring. If Weiss didn’t know any better, she’d say someone or something was orchestrating these events. Weiss had never been one to believe in a higher power, unlike her father, but with the way things were going, perhaps she could be persuaded into believing in a very horny deity.

Speaking of very horny, Weiss’ embarrassment was compounded by the fact that she was quite aroused by the events of the morning and had been afflicted with an uncomfortable hardness. She took a moment away from burying her face in her hands to glower down at the offending tenting in her night dress.

Weiss was sorely tempted to grab her phone and pay Blake’s page a visit to help her relieve the tension, but she resisted the urge. Instead she grabbed the cleanest set of clothes she had, she really needed to do some laundry soon, and after checking the coast was clear, she made a dash for the bathroom.

Door safely locked behind her, Weiss let out a sigh of relief. No chance of any intrusion here. Finally able to relax in her impromptu sanctuary, Weiss started laying out her things in a meticulous order. It wasn’t what she normally did as part of her morning routine, but it helped her think whenever she got stressed and confused like she was right now.

Her light headache from when she woke up was fading now, and Weiss was able to look over the events of last night with clarity. She supposed for the most part it had been rather fun, barring Yang and Blake’s disagreement. Weiss hadn’t realised just how much she missed performing until she’d gotten back up on stage. That in itself was something of a revelation. Weiss had never particularly liked performing, before but with reflection that was probably due to the circumstances rather than a dislike of the performance itself.

Perhaps, if she got the opportunity, she could get back into performing again. With that thought, Weiss was reminded of Blake’s words about Ruby auditioning her for their band, and that was something Weiss really did not feel like addressing right now.

Of course, that wasn’t the only thing that had happened last night, there was also that tension between herself and Ruby when they’d sung together, and of course, Blake’s incredibly suggestive song. If Weiss didn’t know any better, she might have assumed that Blake was trying to seduce her, but Ruby had said it was one of Blake’s favourite songs, so there was no reason to assume she didn’t do that every time it was karaoke night.

In all honesty, the image of Blake Weiss was building up in her head indicated someone who was incredibly sexually liberated. Weiss did wonder for a moment as she undressed, getting ready to take her shower, whether Blake’s choice in career led to this attitude or if the attitude just naturally led into sex work.

It was all academic, however. It didn’t matter how Blake ended up being so casual about sex and nudity, it was just how she was, and Weiss just wasn’t sure if she could put up with it for much longer. Sighing deeply, Weiss stepped into the shower and started cleaning off the smell of the bar and Blake.

No matter how much Weiss might want Blake sexually and possibly romantically, there were just too many obstacles, not least of which being the fact that Blake probably wasn’t interested in her in that way.

Why would anyone want to fuck a stuck up and prissy classical musician? Certainly not Blake, not with her profession and her being something of a rockstar. Weiss was pretty certain that Blake must have dozens of groupies, something Weiss had never had the experience of having. Classical music wasn’t exactly the right sort of scene for that.

No, if Blake had her pick of any heavily pierced aspiring punk, there was no way she’d ever want someone like Weiss. Wallowing in her own self-loathing, Weiss reached out blindly for her shampoo. which was by now living in the shower. and once again her hand wrapped around something long and rubbery.

“Oh. for fuck’s sake!” Weiss groaned, releasing the dildo and hunting through the mess of bottles for her cheap shampoo. She should probably talk to Blake about her habit of storing dildos in inappropriate places, or at least she should if she wasn’t cripplingly embarrassed by finding them in the first place.

Finally finding her shampoo in amongst the bottles, definitely not where she’d left it last, Weiss tried to put the presence of the sex toy and what Blake used it for out of her mind. Unfortunately, her dick had other ideas.

“Oh come on, not again.” She hissed in frustration at her stiffening penis, yet again thinking that talking to the uncooperative part of her body would work. Naturally, it did not work, leading to further reprimands.

“No, I am not jerking off to Blake again, so just stop it.” Weiss was pretty sure that her attempts to order her dick around was a clear sign of her mental degradation since moving in with Blake and the stress she was under.

Since talking to her dick wasn’t having any effect, Weiss decided to studiously ignore the bobbing length and instead focus on washing her hair. It had been a while since she’d given it the attention it deserved, though it did also need more than just the cheap shampoo and conditioner she’d been using on it recently.

Ever since she’d been told to grow it out, she’d become accustomed to using only the finest products, keeping her waist-length hair sleek and shiny as befitting a performer of her calibre. She could already feel the difference that using the cheapest stuff she could buy at the drugstore made. Now that she didn’t really have the time or funds to look after her hair like she used to, maybe it would be better if she didn’t keep it quite so long.

Perhaps if she did that, the different hair products might not have such a great impact as well. Weiss had never been all that enamoured with her long hair, outside of it serving as a very obvious sign that she was a girl.

There was only so much time she could spend working on her hair, however, and her considerations on whether getting it cut shorter was a good idea took her to the end of washing the conditioner out. Unfortunately, it seemed that her dick was still being uncooperative, and Weiss was running out of options.

There was no way she could go back out into the main area of the apartment with a hard-on. Without any other alternatives, other than masturbating, which Weiss refused to entertain at this juncture, Weiss reached out and twisted the temperature control of the shower all the way down.

It took perhaps three seconds for the lovely warm water to turn freezing cold, and Weiss had to bite back a yelp at how cold it was. Still, it did the trick, and after several torturous seconds, Weiss’ dick finally decided to behave.

Shutting off the shower as quickly as she could, Weiss jumped out and wrapped herself in her towel before leaning up against the heated rail with a sigh of relief. Once she was sufficiently warmed up, she dried herself off and pulled on her clothes, ready for a long day of hiding in her room and finishing mixing those tracks.

Weiss didn’t know where Blake was when she emerged from the bathroom, and a quick check of the living room and kitchen confirmed that she wasn’t there. Deciding she must be in her room, Weiss hurriedly returned to her own, and was ready to get those last few changes done when she realised that she’d left the laptop she was borrowing in Blake’s room yesterday.

Praying to whatever gods there were that weren’t horny fucks, Weiss walked out of her room and over to Blake’s. She didn’t have her sign up indicating that she was doing a show, but Weiss wasn’t willing to take any chances, so she knocked loudly on the door.

She had to wait for a surprisingly long amount of time before the door opened and a rather dishevelled Blake popped her head out.

“Hey, Weiss. You need something?” She asked, looking oddly nervous.

“Yeah, sorry but I think I left the laptop in your room yesterday. I wanted to just finish that stuff off this morning.” Weiss explained and Blake seemed to sag in relief.

“Oh sure, one sec.” Blake moved away from the door, inadvertently letting it swing open as she hunted for the laptop. Whilst Blake was now fully clothed, the sight Weiss was treated to was nearly as bad. The apron from earlier lay crumpled in a corner as though someone had thrown it aside in a hurry and Weiss could see a suspiciously wet dildo just lying on the bed.

“Here we go. Once you’re done, I think Ruby wanted you to email it to her.” Blake said, jolting Weiss out of her momentary stupor as she handed over the laptop.

“Right, I’ll have to text her and ask her for it. And probably set up a new email account whilst I’m at it.” Weiss was under no illusions that her father would have her normal email account hacked by now and would use it to spy on her if she ever used it again.

“I’ve got some stuff I should get back to. See you at lunch?” Weiss nodded weakly, knowing exactly what ‘stuff’ Blake had to get back to. With a smile, Blake closed the door and left Weiss to return to her room.

Groaning in frustration, Weiss shut the door behind her and placed the laptop on her bed before glaring down at her returning problem as it tented her skirt. She’d just managed to deal with the problem, and here was Blake, practically parading her sex life in front of Weiss and making it an issue again.

At least she didn’t need to leave the room for a while so, hopefully it would go away on its own, provided she didn’t think about Blake wearing nothing but an apron and fucking herself silly with that dildo.

“Fuck!” Weiss swore out loud as the image she’d just told herself not to think about drifted across her mind’s eye and made her dick strain against her panties even more. Muttering more curses to herself, Weiss crawled onto the bed and opened up the laptop to finish editing the tracks.

She’d only just opened up the program and loaded the tracks that needed the changes made when her phone buzzed on the nightstand. There could only be two people texting her, and one was probably busy stuffing her pussy with a dildo, so Weiss reached over to pick up the phone and see what Ruby was messaging her about.

‘Hey Weiss, hope your hangover isn’t too bad if you’ve got one. How’s Blake doing?’ Weiss smiled a little at the message. Even though Blake had put a thorough damper on the evening’s festivities, it was sweet that Ruby was still concerned about her.

‘She’s fine, she seems to have recovered from her hangover now, and I have possession of her bottle of whiskey.’ Weiss texted back, setting her phone aside to start working. Ruby’s reply was very prompt, coming in less than a minute after Weiss had sent her response.

‘Good to know. She didn’t do anything bad, did she?’ Weiss looked at the message for a few moments, contemplating if she should tell Ruby about Blake’s naked cuddle session before deciding against it. It was embarrassing enough without Ruby knowing about it as well, especially since if Ruby knew, she would probably tell Yang too.

‘No, she just fell asleep on the couch.’

‘That’s good. She can get a little… handsy and stuff when she’s drunk.’ Handsy did not begin to cover what had happened. Rolling her eyes, Weiss sent what she hoped was an appropriate emoji of a laughing face before putting her phone aside properly so she could get her work finished, then she could get paid and finally get those new clothes she desperately needed. She doubted showing up to work tomorrow in one of her elegant dresses was really the image the store was going for.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dildo Count: 4
> 
> Yes, the count does only go up by one here, we're only counting unique dildos and the one in the shower is the same one that Weiss found previously. Does it make any sense? Not really, but it's a bit of fun. Poor Weiss pretty much reaching her breaking point with Blake and her antics though, At least she's got a sympathetic ear with Ruby. 
> 
> I've set up a [discord](https://discord.gg/4t3y25e) so feel free to join and stuff, I'm pretty active there these days.
> 
> Big thanks to [machiavellianFictionist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/machiavellianFictionist) for proofreading and being amazing. Lots of thanks too to my lovely girlfriend [Ruby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RubyAndNanaAO3) for beta reading and being cute, even if she won't let me steal the cats.
> 
> Thank you too to my official supporters, send a PM or hop on the discord server for details.


	12. Chapter 12

“I feel ridiculous.” Weiss sighed, looking at herself in the bathroom mirror.

“You don’t look that bad.” Summer assured her, patting her on the shoulder. It was Monday, and Weiss’ first day of working at Rosebird’s, which meant she finally got her employee shirt. Thankfully, it fit well, but that wasn’t the issue. The issue was that it clashed horribly with Weiss’ skirt and would probably look very out of place with anything that wasn’t artfully ripped up.

“I knew I should have gotten some pants yesterday.” Weiss shook her head regretfully. She’d finished mixing the EP by Sunday afternoon and had sent it off to Ruby to release. Blake had handed over her payment for the job not too long after, but by then it was too late for Weiss to go out to buy anything, not to mention she was still trying to recover from the events of Saturday evening and that morning.

“Well, maybe you can go out once you’ve finished your shift.” Summer suggested encouragingly, guiding Weiss out of the bathroom. “Although, personally, I think it helps sell you as our classical music expert if you’re not wearing torn up skinny jeans, like  _ someone _ .” Her last words were directed at Raven, who was lounging behind the front counter with another of her magazines.

“Hey, they make my ass look great.” Raven fired back, not even bothering to look up. “And you certainly never seem to complain about it at any other time.”

“Whatever you say, Rae-Rae.” Summer rolled her eyes indulgently at her wife. “Right, well, I’ve got some stuff to do in the back. Don’t worry, Weiss, you’ll do fine.” With a pat on the shoulder, Summer left Weiss with Raven as she headed into the offices.

“So…” Weiss rocked awkwardly back and forth on the spot for a moment. “What should I do?”

“Do a run around the store, grab a broom and make sure the floor’s clean before we open up, that kind of thing.” Raven instructed, idly flipping a page of her magazine. “I’ll supervise.”

“And where might I find a broom?” Raven waved a hand in the general direction of the storeroom. Sighing, Weiss followed the woman’s instructions and after a few minutes of searching, found a broom.

Thankfully the store wasn’t particularly dusty or anything, though the place did look and feel rather run down. The flooring looked like it belonged to decades past and the place just had the air of somewhere that was slowly and gracelessly ageing. Weiss did wonder if it was deliberate that they let the store get like this. Yang must have gotten her fixation on ‘authenticity’ from somewhere, after all.

It was a good thing their stock made up for the general run down atmosphere. The few guitars they had on display were immaculately clean, as were the other instruments they had out. Weiss recognised a few of the brands of the various peripherals as well, and they weren’t exactly cheap ones.

Weiss quickly finished up her sweeping and glanced over at Raven. Unsurprisingly, the woman was still reading her magazine and didn’t seem to be paying any attention to what Weiss was doing. Rolling her eyes, Weiss went back into the storeroom to replace the broom before returning to the floor and checking over the shelves of stock, making mental notes of the ones that needed restocking.

Weiss dutifully went back into the stock room and started gathering up the products that needed restocking, all whilst Raven completely ignored her. Weiss wasn’t sure how she felt about that. On the one hand, it was a lot easier to do her work without the woman’s snide remarks that seemed to be her standard way of communicating. On the other, Raven was supposed to be her boss and take some responsibility, not just read trashy celebrity magazines.

Once Weiss was finished with restocking the shelves, she returned to Raven and waited expectantly to receive more instructions. After several minutes of waiting, Weiss finally coughed politely to catch Raven’s attention.

“Oh, you’re done with that, are you?” She said, finally looking up from whatever scandal had engrossed her this time. “I guess you can turn the sign around and man the desk.” She said, getting up off her stool and heading towards the back. “You know what to do, I’ll be in the back with Summer if you need her.”

With that, Raven collected up her magazine and left Weiss slightly stunned as she wandered off into the back. Weiss stood there in confusion for a few minutes before shaking her head and sighing. Walking over to the door, Weiss unlocked it and turned the sign around to open before retreating behind the counter to wait for customers.

The next few hours were spent mostly in boredom. Every so often a customer would come in and browse, before leaving without buying anything. Weiss was starting to understand why Raven seemed to always be reading a magazine. She was very tempted to pull out her phone and start fiddling with it, but she resisted the urge. This was her first day and she had to make a good example.

At about half ten, Weiss’ resolve was waning. She hadn’t seen Raven or Summer in at least an hour and the last bit of her self-restraint was broken by her phone buzzing. Quickly checking around to make sure there were no customers around, Weiss pulled out her phone to check who had texted her.

‘Hey Weiss, the EP’s up now and we’ve already got a bunch of downloads! 😁😁’ Weiss smiled a little at the excitement in Ruby’s text and quickly typed out a reply.

‘That’s great, I’m glad it’s taking off.’

‘All thanks to you of course. We couldn’t have done it without you.’ Weiss felt her face heat up a little at the praise but before she could reply with a denial, another text came in. ‘How’s your first day going?’

‘Slowly.’

‘Yeah, the mornings can be like that. Don’t worry, it’ll pick up in the afternoon when all the kids start coming in for their music lessons.’ Was Ruby’s reassuring reply, and Weiss smiled a little as she typed out her reply.

‘I hope so, I’m the only one out the front at the moment. Is Raven always that…’ Weiss struggled to think of a polite way of saying it. ‘Standoffish?’

Weiss had to set her phone aside for a moment as a customer came in looking for some guitar strings, but by the time she’d finished and rang them up, another message from Ruby had come through.

‘Mama’s not really a morning person. She’ll have warmed up by lunchtime, I promise.’ Weiss wasn’t entirely sure that would be the case, it had been almost a week since they’d first met and Raven seemed completely disinclined to ‘warm up’.

‘If you say so.’ Weiss sighed, very tempted to see if she could sneak a quick nap or something whilst the shop was empty. Casting an eye around the store, Weiss sent off another text to Ruby. ‘This is really boring. Like, even more boring than my life was before and before all I did was practice my instruments.’

‘I’m sorry. 😢😢 That sucks.’ Weiss smiled a little at Ruby’s sympathy and she wondered whether Ruby had spent any time working in her mothers’ store. Her phone buzzed again and there was another message from Ruby. ‘I’m free right now, no deliveries scheduled until lunch. You want me to swing by and keep you company?’

Weiss was rather touched by the offer, but she couldn’t put Ruby out of her way like that, so she typed out a quick response. ‘No, I’ll be fine, thanks, Ruby. Good luck with your deliveries.’

‘Okay, will do! Oh, also, last night was super fun and we should do something like that again sometime. 😁😁😁’ Weiss regarded the Message with a small smile before she was distracted by the doorbell jingling as another customer walked in. It had been a lot of fun, and Weiss was definitely open to singing with Ruby again.

* * *

Without Ruby’s cheerful texts, Weiss’ morning just seemed to drag on for far longer than it actually should have. Every so often, Summer or Raven would poke their head out of the back to make sure everything was okay before retreating. Weiss did have to wonder what they were doing back there, presumably things related to keeping a store running in the background, like ordering stock and things like that. Weiss wasn’t actually sure what went into owning a music store.

Every now and then the shop phone would ring and Weiss would either have to use the antiquated computer system to check if what the potential customer had was in stock or go through the books to mark down their reservations for the various music rooms.

But at least those were something to do. The rest of the time, Weiss sat thoroughly bored behind the counter. She would have used her phone to browse the internet, but she’d used up too much data already and she did not want to ask for the wi-fi password, especially not on the first day when she needed to be making a good impression.

At around lunchtime, Summer emerged fully from the offices to relieve her. “Hey, you can head off and get some lunch. Be back in half an hour, okay?” Nodding gratefully, Weiss grabbed her jacket and headed out to the cafe she and Blake had visited last time they’d been there.

Ordering the same salad as she had last time, Weiss took it to a table and started picking at it unenthusiastically whilst she took advantage of the cafe’s free wi-fi to check up on a few things. Amongst checking the news, Weiss paid a visit to Grimm Sisters’ various social media pages to see how people were receiving the EP.

They seemed to have a small yet dedicated following, as evidenced by the regular commenters on each of their posts. Pinned at the top of all their social media was the announcement of the EP and a link to their website. Out of curiosity, Weiss followed the link to their page. She hadn’t actually looked much into the band themselves outside of the music she’d mixed for them.

The site certainly seemed to match the aesthetic that they were aiming for, the background being all dark and moody colours. From what little Weiss knew of web design, it looked competently done, and Weiss wondered whether one of the band members had done it or they’d gotten someone else to do it.

Whatever they’d done, the site worked, and Weiss spent a little time browsing the various tabs, glancing through the profiles of the members and the link to their Patreon. She elected not to play the one video they had on the site, the thumbnail appeared to show the three performing live on some small cramped stage and Weiss hadn’t gotten a set of headphones of her own yet.

Eventually, Weiss found the page where Ruby had uploaded their new EP and was rather amused to see a little counter had been set up counting the number of downloads. The counter was already in the hundreds, which Weiss found rather gratifying. It also appeared they were letting people have it for free with an optional donation.

Weiss wondered briefly about the wisdom of this. Why would people pay money for something they could just have for free? It made no business sense, and Weiss knew that if her father or any of the people in his world were given the option, they’d take it for free without a second thought and then laugh at the person for not charging.

Weiss was distracted from her examination of some of the comments left on the download’s post by her phone buzzing and a text alert from Blake popping up. Wondering what it could be, Weiss exited her browser to open up the message and immediately regretted it.

It wasn’t a message so much as it was a picture. A picture that depicted a very naked Blake posing artfully for the camera. In a panic, Weiss closed the app and looked around wildly to make sure nobody in the cafe was looking at her and what had been on her screen.

Breathing a sigh of relief when it seemed that she was in the clear, Weiss turned her thoughts to why Blake would be sending her a picture like that. Her phone buzzed again, and Weiss dreaded to think what it was. Daring a glance down, her heart sank just a little when she saw it was another message from Blake.

Carefully, so as not to let anyone else see her phone screen, Weiss opened up the messenger to read what Blake had sent. It was an actual message this time, but it was no less blush-inducing. ‘Hey, sorry about last night. Hope this one makes up for it and cheers you up a bit, babe.’

Weiss blinked in confusion, Blake had never called her babe before. For a moment, Weiss considered just deleting the photo and ignoring it entirely, but after everything that had happened that morning, Weiss decided against it rather quickly.

‘Blake, did you really mean to send me that?’ Weiss sent the message and waited patiently for the response, turning her phone over so she wouldn’t have to see the small amount of the picture that was still visible on the screen.

After a few moments, during which Weiss picked at her rather disappointing salad some more, her phone vibrated again and she picked it up. ‘Shit! I didn’t mean to send you that! I’m so sorry, I’d never send unsolicited nudes!’ Weiss was a little relieved that Blake hadn’t meant to send her the picture, and also a little disappointed, though she pushed that part aside.

‘I see. I take it you meant to send it to someone else?’ Weiss messaged and the reply that came back was not all that surprising.

‘It was supposed to be for Yang, your names are right next to each other in my contacts.’ Weiss nodded as she read the reply. That scanned, though Weiss wasn’t entirely sure how Blake thought sending a naked picture of herself would make up for what happened at the bar. For that matter, the way Blake had phrased her follow up message, Weiss got the impression that she regularly used nudes as a way of apologising to Yang.

Weiss shook her head. She just did not understand the relationship her new friends seemed to have with one another. Pushing it out of her mind for now, Weiss sent off a final message to Blake. ‘It’s all fine, my break finishes soon, so I’ll talk to you when I get back.’

‘Sure, see you then. I promise I won’t send you any more nudes unless you want me to.’ Weiss sighed and rolled her eyes, she was fairly certain that she would never ask Blake to send her nudes, tempting as they might be. In fact, Weiss should probably do something about the nude Blake had already sent to her.

Scrolling back up the message history, Weiss’ thumb hovered over the image, hesitating for some reason. It was a very good picture, artfully taken. Weiss supposed Blake probably had a lot of practice when it came to framing herself naked. She really should delete it, Blake hadn’t meant to send it to her, but still Weiss’ thumb refused to tap the trashcan icon.

It was a very nice picture, after all. It would be a shame to delete it. Weiss bit her lip as she felt blood rushing down to her crotch, her eyes roaming over Blake’s plush curves. Weiss very sorely wanted to bury her face in those curves and show Blake’s body the adoration it deserved. But that would never happen, and keeping the picture would only serve to get Weiss’ hopes up.

Bolstered by this and the knowledge it was the right thing to do, Weiss hit the delete button, ignoring the small part of her that immediately regretted her decision. Sighing, Weiss quickly finished up her lunch and got up from the table. She didn’t have much time before her lunch break was up, and Weiss did not want to be back late on her first day.

* * *

Ruby had been right, the shop did end up getting busier in the afternoon, especially after the schools let out for the day and the various students and music tutors drifted in to use the various rooms. Thankfully, nobody seemed to recognise her. It seemed that she was unknown even among teachers of classical music. Either that or it was just beyond imagination that a renowned performer would end up working minimum wage in a small music store.

Still, the anonymity was refreshing. Rarely had she met anyone who didn’t recognise her before she left. Of course, people not knowing who she was meant that she wasn’t always getting the fawning and bending over backwards she was used to.

“I’m sorry, sir, but Mr Port just isn’t free tomorrow.” Weiss told the angry man as patiently as she could whilst resisting the urge to bash her head against the counter.

“You’re nothing but a lying little girl! I know he’s got space somewhere for my little angel, she’s a clarinet prodigy and he’d be grateful to teach her!” The angry man ranted, barely a few inches away from Weiss’ face, forcing her to move back a little. She glanced down at the young girl, who looked to be maybe eight or nine, clutching her clarinet case and watching the confrontation with wide-eyes.

“Sir, please, could you refrain from shouting? As I have told you, Mr Port has a free slot next Wednesday when he can meet your daughter and assess whether he’s a suitable teacher for her.” Weiss said in as calm a tone as she could muster.

“That’s not good enough!” The man continued to rage, and Weiss wondered if she should call for help from Raven or Summer, both having left for a late lunch break a little earlier, promising to be back soon. “I know my daughter’s better than any of his other students. Just give me one of their slots!”

“I’m afraid I can’t do that, sir.” Weiss was very tempted to tell the man to just get out if she weren’t afraid of him assaulting her. Not to mention she did feel a little sorry for the man’s daughter, and she hoped the young girl wouldn’t be discouraged from playing because of her father’s attitude. “How would you feel if someone came in and asked me to give them your slot?”

“But my daughter is a prodigy!” Weiss groaned internally. Why did Summer and Raven have to go on break at the same time, on her first day as well?

“Even prodigies have to follow the rules, sir.”

“Then I’ll be talking to your manager. Where is he?”

“I’m afraid both the managers are out on break at the moment, sir.” Weiss informed the man, not bothering to correct the pronouns. He just wasn’t worth it at this point. “You can either wait for them to come back or I can give you the store number so you can call them later.”

“Like I’ve got time to wait around.” The man scoffed, folding his arms. “I’ll take that number, and I’ll make sure you get properly punished for obstructing the learning of a young genius.”

“Of course, sir.” Weiss said pleasantly, grabbing a scrap of paper and jotting down the store’s number. She already knew whose side Raven and Summer would take when they saw the CCTV footage later. Holding out the piece of paper, the man snatched it from her grip and marched out of the store with his daughter in tow.

The moment the door jingled shut, Weiss let out a long groan and rested her head on the counter. She really hoped that her new life wasn’t going to consist of getting yelled at every day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dildo Count: 4
> 
> Ah the joys of working in retail, poor Weiss having to deal with the general public and is not having a great time of it. At least she got a nice picture to help her through it. There was a short discussion about whether Blake sent the photo to Weiss deliberately and is only covering for herself by saying it was meant for Yang. But it was decided that sending unsolicited nudes was going a bit too far, even for this Blake who is very forward with what she wants. I'd like to say that it's only Weiss who would be this dense and not notice Blake wanting to fuck her, but I know for a fact I would be just as clueless.
> 
> I've set up a [discord](https://discord.gg/4t3y25e) so feel free to join and stuff, I'm pretty active there these days.
> 
> Big thanks to [machiavellianFictionist](https://archiveofourown.org/users/machiavellianFictionist) for proofreading and being hella cute. Lots of thanks too to my lovely girlfriend [Ruby](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RubyAndNanaAO3) for beta reading and trying to keep my mood up.
> 
> Thank you too to my official supporters, send a PM or hop on the discord server for details.


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